Tiny Buddha

Tag: stress

  • Why I Quit Beast Mode and How I Traded Burnout for Peace and Balance

    Why I Quit Beast Mode and How I Traded Burnout for Peace and Balance

    “Beast mode.” Sounds pretty badass, doesn’t it?

    It’s like an adrenaline-fueled battle cry, a call to arms. It’s a way of life that’s all about giving every single thing you’ve got to every single thing you do.

    For most of my life, I lived this mantra—and prided myself for living this way.

    In fact, I had a sticker on my bathroom mirror with the words “beast mode” that I stared at all the time. It was my constant reminder to be all in, every single day, pushing harder, reaching further.

    But here’s the reality check: Life isn’t supposed to be a non-stop action flick or an eternal Olympic sprint.

    When you live that way, you’re always running on empty.

    In fact, I felt like I was a smartphone on 1% battery all the freaking time.

    And I’m not just talking about feeling physically wiped out. I was mentally and emotionally zonked, too. I knew there had to be something better than living in permanent beast mode… running on fumes… sputtering through my days.

    Eventually, it all just clicked for me. I realized that I had become so caught up in the hustle, so obsessed with the “how much,” that I’d lost sight of the “why” … for what purpose?

    After all, busyness should not equate with worthiness!

    And that’s when I decided to shift gears, from the non-stop grind of beast mode… to the thoughtful pacing of what I now call my “best mode.”

    Beast Mode vs. Best Mode

    Beast Mode is like running on full throttle all the time. It’s all about maximum effort, maximum speed, maximum output. It can be incredibly effective in the short-term but can also lead to burnout and loss of direction in the long run.

    Best Mode is about finding a sustainable, balanced, and intentional way of living. It’s about setting mindful, meaningful goals and pursuing them at a thoughtful pace. It’s an approach that values self-care, reflection, and mindful action as much as achievement and productivity. In best mode, you’re not just achieving, you’re enjoying the journey. You’re living your best life, not just a busy one.

    Now, I’m here to share my journey from beast mode to best mode, my transition from being a human-doing to a human-being. And let me tell you, it’s not only enriched my life,  it’s made it infinitely more fulfilling, and, dare I say, significantly more enjoyable.

    The Appeal of Beast Mode

    We live in a world where the common refrain is always: “Do more! Be more! Achieve more!”

    And beast mode fits snugly into this ethos.

    It’s not just a mindset. It is a state of being.

    It’s about relentlessly striving for success, pushing past limits, and breaking barriers.

    Admittedly, it gives you a buzz, a rush. I remember the thrill, the allure of being in beast mode. The feeling that I was invincible, a juggernaut, an unstoppable force. There was something intoxicating about it, something that drew me in and held me in its grip.

    The Downsides of Constant Beast Mode

    But here’s the kicker: Living in beast mode is like running on a treadmill that’s always cranked up to max speed. It’s exhausting, draining.

    You’re sprinting at breakneck speed, but where are you going?

    What are you really achieving?

    And at what cost?

    Because in the midst of this relentless pursuit, you start to lose sight of what’s really important.

    Relationships, peace of mind, the simple joys of life. They all get left in the dust.

    Plus, often beast mode leads to a more beastly mood. You feel on edge a lot of the time. Or simply exhausted.

    Basically, beast mode is a relentless grind that leads you straight down a one-way street to Burnoutsville. Trust me, it’s a place you don’t want to visit.

    The Value of Balance over Burnout

    Over time, as I got older, I began to see through the illusion.

    I started to realize that life is more than a marathon, more than a series of boxes to check off.

    A good life is about appreciating the moments in between, the simple pleasures, the quiet joys.

    It’s about my kid’s laughter echoing through our home, a shared meal with my family, a good book on a lazy afternoon.

    These simple moments are the essence of a good life. They’re the threads that weave the tapestry of our existence.

    And these threads started to matter more to me, more than any achievement or accolade.

    So one morning I peeled that “beast mode” sticker off my bathroom mirror, and began to try to live differently.

    How I Quit Beast Mode and Burnout 

    Breaking up with beast mode was no easy feat. It was like trying to sever ties with a toxic friend who just doesn’t want to let go.

    But once I managed to break free, it was like a breath of fresh air. I found peace… tranquility… balance.

    And I discovered that balance trumps beast mode any day.

    The calm mornings, the shared stories, the unhurried afternoons, the dancing to music in the middle of the day—these became my new triumphs.

    These simple, peaceful, intimate moments became my new improved yardstick for success.

    And they became the milestones that truly mattered most.

    5 Tips to Quit Beast Mode and Embrace Best Mode Instead

    Now, if you’ve managed to stick with me so far, here’s some straight-shooting advice, fresh from my own experience.

    Coming up now are my top tips for quitting beast mode—and thereby quitting burnout mode too!

    1. Embrace the Joy of Missing Out (JOMO).

    It’s perfectly okay to say ‘no’ to things. The world won’t come crashing down if you miss a meeting or skip a gym session. You’re not the fulcrum of the universe, even though it can feel like it sometimes. Relax, let go, and savor the joy of missing out.

    2. Redefine Success.

    Success doesn’t always have to mean grinding 24/7. It’s about finding balance, achieving contentment, and enjoying peace. It’s not a one-size-fits-all concept. Define success on your own terms and let the world be damned.

    3. Cultivate Mindfulness.

    Be present. Bask in the moment. Not the one that’s waiting around the corner or the one that’s five years down the line. I’m talking about the moment that’s happening right now, this very instant. It’s fleeting, ephemeral, and it’s worth your attention.

    4. Prioritize Relationships.

    Remember, it’s the people in your life that matter. Not your achievements, not your work, not the number of zeros in your bank account. People, relationships, these are the things that enrich your life. So make time for them. Even if it means putting your beast mode persona on hold.

    5. Balance, Balance, Balance.

    I can’t stress this enough. Life isn’t a sprint; it’s a marathon. It’s a journey that’s meant to be savored, not rushed through. It’s about finding equilibrium, maintaining stability, juggling different aspects of your life so that you’re not just running blindly toward an ever-receding finish line. Balance, my friend, is the key to a fulfilling life.

    Conclusion: Quit Beast Mode and Burnout

    So there you have it. That’s my story of why I ditched beast mode and chose the best mode life of balance.

    And I have zero regrets. In fact, I couldn’t be happier.

    So, take a moment to reflect, to think about where you’re at… and where you’re heading.

    What would your life look like if you decided to give beast mode the boot and embraced a life of balance instead?

  • The Hidden Reasons You’re Stuck (And What to Do When Conventional Advice Fails)

    The Hidden Reasons You’re Stuck (And What to Do When Conventional Advice Fails)

    “The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy, or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers.” ~M. Scott Peck

    Have you ever been in a situation or a stage in your life where you’ve felt physically stuck, as if you’ve fallen into some kind of invisible quicksand that you can’t get out of?

    Or maybe it’s felt more like you have a thick, invisible elastic band around your waist, and no matter how hard you push forward, it pulls against you, holding you in place? Or maybe it’s like a sky-high brick wall that you can’t find your way through, around, or over?

    Getting stuck in life can feel frustrating, annoying, upsetting, and confusing. And if you’ve been stuck for too long or at a time when you really need to move forward, you’ve probably found yourself panicking and feeling afraid because if you don’t take action, it may seem like your life will collapse—that you may end up financially destitute, homeless, alone, or a failure.

    The Place Where You Are Stuck is Your Growing Edge

    Everyone gets stuck at times. It tends to occur when you arrive on the threshold of a new direction, taking a risk, doing something new, or needing to leave something behind and launch yourself into the unknown.

    I’ve been stuck many times in my life, sometimes briefly and sometimes for longer periods when I’ve had to accept that I needed to make big changes to my life and along with them, make choices and difficult decisions or learn something deeply and powerfully.

    This place where you are stuck is your growing edge. It is the threshold between the known and the unknown, who you are and who you’re becoming.

    Sometimes you might have no idea why you’re stuck, only that you can’t move forward. It’s a place that you may consciously or unconsciously try to escape by either avoiding your stuckness or trying to get over your edge and out of the discomfort too quickly.

    Sometimes we get stuck unnecessarily for way too long because we keep hitting the edge and avoiding it or keep applying strategies to get unstuck that don’t address the real cause.

    We often think of getting stuck as a problem to solve, but in my experience, it usually holds a bounty of insight, gifts, power to reclaim, and healing. It can even serve the unfolding of your life by keeping you aligned with your destiny and soul’s callings (or greater purpose, if you don’t believe in those things).

    Why Conventional Advice Didn’t Help You Get Unstuck

    Much has been written about how to get unstuck, but I’ve found that a lot of the advice is based on unnamed assumptions about the reasons you are stuck.

    A common assumption is that it is a mindset issue, so a lot of the advice relates to changing your thoughts and conscious beliefs, cultivating different attitudes and positive mindsets, or using willpower to keep going and find the next step.

    If you have followed any of this type of advice but failed to get unstuck, you may feel like something is wrong with you. But I want to lovingly tell you that there isn’t anything wrong with you. The problem is in the solution that simply didn’t address the root of your stuckness.

    My Experience of Being Stuck

    My most recent bout of stuckness was pretty painful and at times frightening in the context of my life. After pushing hard over several days to write a heap of content for my business, I woke up the next morning feeling depleted, empty, and sad. And I couldn’t write again for weeks.

    If I was writing for fun, then maybe I could have just completely surrendered and waited for the words to return, but as a self-employed business owner, writing forms a large part of my work. I write all of my own website, blog, and marketing content. Not being able to write was scary because it put my business at risk.

    Initially, I tried all the usual things: surrender, acceptance, movement, doing something fun, positive self-talk and encouragement, believing in myself, and looking for the next small step I could take. While these things were helpful, especially in terms of alleviating stress, they didn’t help me get unstuck because when I came back to writing, I was still blocked.

    The Real Reasons I Was Stuck and How I Discovered Them

    When the usual things didn’t help me get unstuck, I sat down with my journal to start inquiring in a loving, gentle way about was happening in my experience and inside me.

    To begin, I did some slow, deep belly breathing with one hand on my heart and the other on my belly. This is a polyvagal breathing exercise that helps to bring your nervous system into a state of relaxation and increases your sense of safety.

    Then I sat with my experience of stuckness and the uncomfortable feelings that arose and noticed what was happening inside me. A conversation with my body and soul unfolded that continued on and off over many days.

    This is what I discovered about why I was stuck.

    1. I had become too immersed in masculine energy in my approach to my writing: linear, direct, and factual.

    I had made it a problem to be solved, a task to be completed. While I cared about writing well and my audience, I had disconnected from the deeper voice within me that held the poetry, beauty, and wisdom of what I truly wanted to say. I call this my soul voice. Essentially, I was trying to write from my head and not my heart.

    2. I was trying to write what I thought others wanted to know or read, in a way I thought I should do it, which wasn’t congruent with what my soul wanted to express through me.

    I believed that I had to write in a certain way to connect with people and be liked rather than just write as myself. I was trying to people-please, which is an old trauma response.

    3. Different parts of me were in conflict, and their conflict needed to be listened to and resolved.

    My sensitive parts didn’t like my overly practical approach to writing and were actively pushing against the “let’s get on with it” part that was trying to get it done. You could think of it like my heart pushing back against my head in opposition, saying “this isn’t the way to proceed.”

    4. Less obvious was an inner critic that redirected me to write from my head.

    Its voice was quiet, blended in my thoughts. It was trying to stop me from writing as my true self to protect me from the risk of criticism that a young innocent part of me would find devastating—an old trauma.

    Once I recognized and sat with all of my insights about why I was stuck, I was able to hear my deeper self and find my way back into writing by listening to what my heart and soul wanted to express, while reassuring my anxious parts.

    I shared little chunks of writing on social media that I felt inspired to share, not because I thought I should or wanted to please anyone but myself. This trickle eventually found its way to become a greater river. My writer’s block ceased. My stuckness was gone.

    The Hidden Reasons You’re Stuck

    The reason you’re stuck is not necessarily a result of your mindset, attitude, or willpower, or solely because of your beliefs. The reasons you are stuck are deeper than that.

    They’re often hidden, obscure, or unobvious because they’re hanging out in your unconscious where you haven’t looked or been able to see them. They can be entangled and intertwined.

    We get stuck because of deep inner conflicts between parts of ourselves that we aren’t aware of or listening to, limiting beliefs created and held by young parts of ourselves, and trauma that has been protectively pushed down but may surface.

    We get stuck when we try to ignore or avoid difficult feelings, or when we’re scared of going for the thing that we want or need to do that our nervous system perceives as dangerous, sending us into a fight, flight, freeze or even fawn response to try and make unworkable situations work.

    Your conscious mind might think you want what you say you want, but unconscious parts of you say no.

    You might have inner critical figures meanly berating you or quietly discouraging you in a way that seems helpful or loving but isn’t. You might not have enough inner or outer allies to help you take the step you want to take or cultivate the skills you need to cultivate.

    You can also get stuck when the thing you’re trying to do isn’t aligned with your destiny or soul’s calling and your stuckness is a symptom of higher intervention.

    How to Find the Hidden Reasons You’re Stuck

    1. Offer yourself love and compassion, coupled with gentle curiosity about your stuckness.

    This will help your body relax and feel safe. You won’t discover what you are looking for by being forceful or unfeeling toward yourself.

    2. Befriend it.

    Before you can get out of your stuckness you must be willing to be with it and relate to it. Even if you try to detour your way around it or avoid it, the lessons that lie within it will appear again at another time in your life because you’re here to learn and grow.

    Life lessons we need to learn repeat. What you learn will serve you for the rest of your life.

    3. If you feel stressed and anxious about your situation, try some polyvagal breathing exercises to bring your nervous system into a state of rest and digest so you’ll feel safer.

    It’s hard to think and see clearly if your body is very activated or stressed or even in a freeze or shutdown.

    4. Find time to consciously hang out with your stuckness, breathe with it, and if you are able to, tune into your body.

    Ask, listen, and see what bubbles up and what you notice is going on beneath the surface. For me, meditation and journaling worked, but they’re not for everyone. Maybe intentional walking, dancing, praying, or talking into your phone is better for you.

    Here, you must be kind, gentle, and welcoming. Digging for answers and clues, especially in a forceful or problem-solving way, can make your sensitive inner world and young parts freeze up and not reveal anything because they feel unsafe.

    5. Hang out and breathe with your insights so you feel safe.

    This can often be enough for your stuckness to unfreeze or for you to form insights about your next step.

    Other times you will need to do some work to process emotions, work through inner conflicts and limiting beliefs, and heal your young parts and traumas. You may need therapeutic support for this.

    6. If you’ve tried the above and you’re still stuck, seek the help of a therapeutic practitioner or safe, compassionately honest loved one.

    We all have blind spots where we can’t see things clearly about ourselves. It’s human nature.

    You may have painful experiences kept out of your conscious awareness that need healing.

    Sometimes you just need help and a safe space to discover what you can’t see and to be held safely with your experience and what arises.

  • Releasing Fascia: A Simple Way to Reduce Tension, Pain, and Disease

    Releasing Fascia: A Simple Way to Reduce Tension, Pain, and Disease

    “Take care of your body, it’s the only place you have to live.” ~Jim Rohn

    I hear this happens to so many, but when it happens to you, it’s unsettling. I didn’t know what was going on with me, and I wasn’t getting any satisfying answers either.

    Most days were good, and I felt fine and went about my regular routine wearing my many hats: mother of two young kids, human mom to three fur babies, a household-manager-of-all-the-things and full-time dental hygienist. And then out of the blue, it could hit me like a ton of bricks… the backache, neck pain, jaw pain, tension headaches, and even migraines.

    I would wake up in the morning with tension or pain in my body, but I had no idea how it got there! Sometimes it was pretty intense too, It would drive me bananas because I couldn’t put my finger on the reason why.

    Didn’t do any yard work yesterday. Didn’t hurt myself. Didn’t trip or fall. Didn’t shovel snow the last few days either. It was so strange. I had no idea what was going on.

    I remember that the first time it happened, I was about thirteen years old. It was a summer morning, and I wasn’t able to get out of bed to go to my babysitting job. Another time, in my late twenties, my lower back seized as I was bent down shaving my legs, so I dropped to the floor unable to get back up. There were many times like these.

    When I had one of those unexplained episodes, I would feel off for a few days and then it would settle. Luckily for me, most days I just felt my regular minimal tension at night. It wasn’t intense, but it was enough for me to notice.

    Other times, I’d have migraines or tension headaches that would last for days at a time. It wasn’t fun for anyone, including my young family. I also felt guilty and stressed out with my list of errands getting longer by the minute. I wanted to avoid this at all costs because it would stop me in my tracks when it happened, and everyone around me suffered.

    During medical visits I was told I had muscle spasms, tension headaches, or migraines. And was told to relax (right!) or prescribed something for the pain or given a topical cream to rub on the affected area. It helped, but I still didn’t understand why it would happen out of the blue like that.

    In my circle, I was hearing things like: “Wait till you hit thirty or forty, that’s when all the problems start!” or “Wait ‘til you’re my age!’ or ‘Welcome to the club!” or my favorite one: “You ain’t seen nothing yet!” To be honest, it was upsetting and depressing to hear that things would get worse as I aged.

    Ever have an ultrasound, scan, or MRI only to be told that everything looked normal? That it must be muscular, or even worse, it’s all in your head? It’s a very frustrating diagnostic for most people, as they are left feeling puzzled and still looking for answers. They’re hoping to find anything that could help, to alleviate some of the pain and tension. They’ve done many things, but nothing seems to help…

    As it turns out, it’s all about fascia!

    What is FA-SH-EE-AH? It is a connective tissue in our body. Picture one continuous piece of a three-dimensional spider web, from head to toe. It’s a semi-opaque membrane, thicker in some areas.

    This tissue does not only wrap or divide our organs, muscles, and other body parts, like previously thought, but it actually interconnects every single one of our cells, all 100 trillion of them! Fascia is everywhere! It protects us, it supports surrounding tissues, and communicates with our entire being. It is the only system in the body that connects to every other system in our body.

    The magic of our precious fascia doesn’t stop here, as it also has a memory! It records our entire life, but it’s the traumatic events—the physical, repetitive, and emotional stresses (every fall, burn, bruise, surgery, repetitive movement), the viruses (hello, Covid!), and infections… plus unprocessed emotions, negative thoughts, limiting beliefs, and unhealthy habits and behaviors—that affect it the most. From the 3rd trimester in the uterus to our last breath, our fascia keeps track and memorizes everything.

    Our beautiful body does have the potential to auto-regulate, and so does our fascia. But we live in a world where productivity is a sport, our to-do lists are never-ending, and our over-scheduling is a badge of honor. This absolutely takes a toll on our body and mind! Therefore, our fascia doesn’t always release like it’s supposed to, and it starts accumulating tensions.

    Tight fascia, that is unreleased, clamps down on its surrounding tissues and gets worse with time. Left unreleased, it can get rock hard. Plus, since it’s like a 3D blanket, it starts affecting and pulling other parts of the body… just like when you tug or pull on a corner of a blanket, it pulls on the entire thing. The fascia in our body is the exact same!

    This is why the root cause of our symptoms may be coming from a completely different place in our body. And it explains why many therapies don’t work, as they treat the location of the symptom and not the cause.

    Bound fascia creates havoc on our health and wellness and has a domino effect on our body and mind. It impacts all our cells (every tissue that makes up the muscles, organs, bones/joints, and all the other systems).

    As an example, clamped fascia that is tight around and inside an organ (remember, fascia is in every cell) will affect this organ so much that it won’t be able to function properly.

    The pain in your neck that keeps coming back, your tight shoulder blades and digestive issues, could all be from tight fascia from that time when you fell off your bike when you were learning to ride at the age of five years old. Your fascia protected you in the fall, but it’s been tight all this time and is now pulling on your 3D fascia blanket.

    The TMJ issues you’ve been experiencing, the acid reflux, and reduced range of motion in your shoulder could be from when you had your appendix removed as a child. With scars, we only see a tiny scar on the skin, but inside, it’s an iceberg of adhesion and it’s pulling constantly!

    That nagging hip tension that’s been around for ages, the ringing in your left ear, and your weak bladder could all be from your high-risk pregnancy and stressful delivery. Those babies take up a lot of room, and our tissues should go back to their original place, but sometimes they don’t, and that starts pulling too! Not to mention the impact of all that stress of having a high-risk delivery; this too could very well be the root cause of your issues!

    Healthy fascia is the missing piece to health and wellness! A holistic approach is needed to release this complex tissue, which impacts us in so many ways. For optimal health, gentle movements are best to release bound fascia and relax your nervous system, which go hand-in-hand.

    If your intention is to release your fascia, you’ll want to avoid anything that is too intense or that jacks it up like HIIT, spinning, and marathons.

    Other than body work (osteopathy, energy work, massage), walking, swimming, yoga, and meditation are great options that you can do without an appointment. Every bit counts! Here are some things you can add to your daily routine to keep your fascia happy and pliable:

    First, stay hydrated! Drink water throughout the day. The general rule of thumb is to drink your weight in pounds, divided by two. That’s the number of ounces your body requires daily to function properly. Therefore, someone that weighs 200 pounds could benefit from drinking 100 ounces of water per day. Some exceptions apply, but for most people this is a good guideline. Remember, we are mostly water, and that includes our fascia!

    Stretching is a must! To stretch a muscle, it takes twenty to thirty seconds, but to stretch and release one layer of our dysfunctional fascia, it can take around three to five minutes, sometimes more.

    Yoga is a great fascia therapy, as it’s wonderfully designed around fascia lines; for example, downward dog stretches the posterior line of fascia. Thread the needle pose stretches the arm line. Fish pose stretches the anterior line.

    Hatha is the style of yoga that most of us think of when we picture yoga. Downward dog, warrior pose, child’s pose, lotus, to name a few poses, are all great options to try.

    In yin yoga, we hold the poses longer, about three to five minutes, which is long enough to release the fascia. That’s when all the magic happens! These poses are gentler. As we hold them, we can feel a little flutter or a soft release somewhere else in the body. It’s all connected!

    Another kind of yoga that is great for our fascia health is restorative yoga. This one is a very passive yoga done with many props. It’s all about supporting the body and feeling safe. This creates immense healing, as it activates the parasympathetic nervous system. It’s incredibly powerful and utterly relaxing! So, let’s not discredit this type of yoga because it’s more passive than the others. The benefits are exponential!

    EFT/Tapping Meditation is also a great option to release tension in our fascia. As we tap on specific acupressure points on meridians in the body (hint: meridian and fascia lines are in the same places!), we release stored unprocessed emotions, limiting beliefs, and negative thought patterns, which all impact our fascia.

    It’s an amazing body-mind release technique! Tapping also activates the vagus nerve, promoting rest and relaxation, which is what we want, as the happiness of your fascia depends on the state of your nervous system, and vise-versa.

    Fascia health is a journey, and it’s so worth it! Do yourself a favor and start releasing your fascia today. Caring for it has the best return on investment and undeniably impacts your health and well-being. You totally deserve it, and your future self will thank you!

  • Learning to Have Faith That All Is Well

    Learning to Have Faith That All Is Well

    “If you believe it will work out, you’ll see opportunities. If you believe it won’t, you will see obstacles.” ~Wayne Dyer

    Gwen and I first met at a lactation group for new moms. She seemed like someone I’d get along with, and we talked here and there, eventually becoming Facebook friends, but nothing more.

    Fate (or just good luck) intervened, though, when we met up again months later at the first birthday party of a mutual acquaintance’s daughter.

    Gwen was the only person I knew at the party (other than the hostess, of course), and I was the only person she knew, so we started chatting. I was quickly reminded of how much I liked her, and after she told me she was desperate to hang out with someone other than her retired next door neighbor, we made a plan to meet up.

    We clicked immediately. We talked parenting, politics, relationships, and more, and on a really deep, intimate level. I felt like I’d known her forever, and by the end of our first playdate she said something along the lines of, “I really like you and I’m so glad we had the chance to meet again!”

    I felt so happy and full, and our relationship continued along this way for more than a year. Our kids were close in age, so we’d play at each other’s houses, meet at a playground, or do some sort of activity. One time we went away to a lake for a few nights and I had more fun (and talked more) than I’d had since I was a teenager.

    Then things changed a little bit. We both got busier, and the fact that we lived about forty minutes away from one another made it challenging to hang out. Our visits dwindled to about once a month instead of once a week, though we were always happy to see each other.

    Or so I thought.

    A few months after this shift, we went more than a month without seeing each other. I had contacted her at one point, but she had said she wasn’t available on any of the days I was free.

    Two more weeks passed and I heard nothing. Finally, with her birthday on the horizon, I texted her to say that it was weird not talking to her, and that I missed her. No response.

    I texted a childhood friend, someone whom I’ve known for decades, and asked her what she thought I should do. She said Gwen was probably just busy, and I shouldn’t worry about it.

    A couple of days later I sent another follow up text to Gwen, one that simply said “Hello?” and heard nothing once again.

    I started to get really down whenever I thought about the situation. Even though we’d both been much busier lately, each taking on part-time jobs and working on side businesses of our own, I felt gloomy and worried. I thought we’d be friends for the long haul.

    One night, while I was lying in bed, I talked to myself about just letting it go. Being mad wasn’t going to do anything, being hurt wasn’t going to help, and I’d done my best to reach out.

    And then you know what? I woke up one day and there was a text from her.

    It said, “Did you get my texts?? I think something is wrong with my phone, because I haven’t heard from you at all, but I just saw that all of your recent texts had gone to my iPad!” I immediately texted her back, and we realized the issue had to do with her getting a new phone, a technological glitch.

    We happily texted each other back and forth, with me even telling her how I was wondering what the heck was going on, and quickly made plans for the next week.

    When I went online later that same day, I saw she’d posted a message on my timeline that said something similar to her text: “I don’t think our texts are getting to each other. Message me!”

    Here’s what struck me when I read that: Gwen had faith. In herself, in our friendship, perhaps in life in general.

    I did not.

    Why did I automatically assume she didn’t want to be friends with me anymore after she didn’t respond to just a couple of texts? Why didn’t I send her a message on Facebook? Why didn’t I try calling her? Why did I just give up?

    I realized this was a pattern with me; I was often looking for the bad in things rather than the good. Looking for reasons why things wouldn’t work out rather than why they would. This was something I needed to change.

    The incident with Gwen happened nearly two years ago now, and thinking back on it, I see how much I’ve changed and how much better my attitude is.

    First of all, I’ve realized how much my thoughts and outlook impact every single area of my life. In this scenario, I could have told myself something kind instead of assuming the worst. I could have thought, “It’s been a long time, I bet Gwen misses seeing me, too!” instead of thinking she didn’t want to be friends anymore.

    I had and have no control over someone else’s thoughts or actions, so even if it was true that Gwen didn’t want to have a friendship anymore, I could have looked for things to appreciate instead of automatically jumping to the bad.

    Thinking about how thankful I was to have had the friendship when I really needed it while at home with a young child, or being appreciative of meeting someone I could talk to so easily, regardless of how long the relationship lasted, would have both been more beneficial stories to tell myself than the negative ones.

    Second, I’ve developed more faith in myself and in life. I’ve often struggled to believe that things can work out, regardless of the area of my life I’m thinking about (career, relationships, finances), and focusing on what’s working rather than dwelling on the negative has made a big difference.

    Sure, things can go wrong, but my deep sense of believing it’s going to be okay regardless of what’s happening in the moment has caused a big shift in my world. If the same thing happened today, I have confidence that I would tell myself, “All is well, and no matter how this works out, I can handle it.”

    Third, I’ve worked on changing the “I’m not good enough” story that makes me question my worth as a human being. Talk about a recurring theme in my life! Whether I was stressed about my performance at work or worrying over a guy I liked, I often had the “not good enough” story on repeat in the background. This affected the Gwen situation in a big way, because I was letting myself believe I was somehow unworthy of our friendship and believing something was wrong with me.

    This is still a work in progress, but I’ve come a long way. Catching myself when I have these thoughts is important, as well as reminding myself that it’s just something I’m making up, and humans all have similar thoughts. Getting stuck in them makes things worse; doing something positive for myself, like going for a walk or taking a nap, can make them better.

    Lastly, I’ve tried to just stop worrying. About everything. Yes, that’s a tall order, and no, I’m not completely there yet, but being aware of my worry allows me to channel it into something else.

    For instance, if I found myself worrying over my friendship status with someone now, I’d stop, take a step back, and ask myself if there’s anything I could take action on in that moment. If I decided yes, I’d take that action, whether it was picking up the phone or sending an email, but if I decided no, I’d be diligent about changing my focus to something else. Worry doesn’t solve anything, it only digs you into a deeper hole.

    It can feel difficult to shift deeply ingrained thoughts and patterns, but when you realize they’re making your life harder and sadder than it needs to be, you’ll see they’re worth the work to change them.

  • How Pain Can Be a Teacher and Why We Need to Stop Avoiding It

    How Pain Can Be a Teacher and Why We Need to Stop Avoiding It

    “The strongest hearts have the most scars.” ~Unknown

    I always hated pain when growing up. For as long as I can remember I tried to avoid it. Physical pain was uncomfortable, but emotional pain was the real torture. It was sometimes easier to have a fight and stop communicating than to have a challenging conversation.

    Disconnecting emotionally and withdrawing from painful experiences was my de facto subconscious strategy. I still pursued goals and succeeded, but this didn’t feel painful to me because I used my passion and bravado to drive through the long hours and grueling work.

    If I wasn’t avoiding pain, I was in denial. It cost me. Ignoring a painful feeling made me numb all over. Denying an unpleasant emotion made me oblivious to the whole spectrum of sensations.

    Avoiding dentists created more issues and massive bills down the road. Dodging challenging scenarios and boredom cost me passions and hobbies that could have led to a different career or a creative outlet.

    This continued until one day I found myself without busy work and distractions when taking a career break. Not being able to hide behind time fillers, a whole army of emotions and feelings came at once. The bottled-up monster escaped, the dam broke, and the castle fell under attack.

    It was overwhelming and frightening. Remembering from my coaching training that sensory adaptation will kick in at some point, I let it all play out. I meditated for hours observing the emotions rising and falling like an ocean tide. Eventually, the monster deflated and the flood dried out.

    Recognizing that there is an issue is the first step to resolving it. I realized that this was not the way I wanted to continue living. After learning more about mind machinery, I became aware of my behavioral patterns. Enneagram type 7, called Enthusiast or Epicurian, perfectly described how I ran “Me”—motivated by a desire to be happy and avoid discomfort.

    Before that, I accepted my pain avoidance patterns as an unchangeable status quo. I did not see reality in any different way. With time, I learned that pain was not the bogeyman to be afraid of.

    Pain became my teacher, an early alarm that something was not going well, and a motivator. Getting praise and encouragement for good behavior isn’t the only way to learn. Our participation prizes-driven society creates a false sense of entitlement, preventing us from personal growth.

    Teacher pain can fix unproductive behavior or an issue almost instantaneously. As cruel as they can be, these lessons are long remembered and followed sometimes our whole lives. A perfect example of this is how Tony Robbins made his early mark as a quit smoking coach by making clients associate nausea and fear of his booming voice with cigarettes.

    To be clear, I’m not suggesting we should knowingly hurt ourselves or others as a teaching tool; just that we need to stop avoiding pain and discomfort because they can both lead to growth.

    When I became appreciative and respectful of pain, I was able to slow down and learn more about what it taught me.

    Our bodies communicate through sensations. Pain is one of the common languages that the body uses to make us understand in a split second that something isn’t right. It also can speak for both your body and mind, as our emotional and physical circuitry is interconnected. Taking Panadol can ease the pain of social rejection in the same way it can fix your headache.

    It is the language that bonds us with other humans. Shared painful experiences do not need to be explained. They are understood on a deeper level. Compassion is born from the language of pain, as it makes us appreciate what another person is going through.

    What would our lives be like if we never experienced pain? Without an early alarm system, a broken bone would not hurt, eventually causing a deadly infection. A serious illness would go unnoticed until a person perished. Congenital insensitivity to pain is a very rare condition affecting 1 out of 25,000 newborns. It is also very dangerous, and most affected people do not survive their childhood.

    When we strip away pain from its emotionally excruciating quality, it is essentially a sensation. Experienced meditators can attest that knee and back pain during long seated meditation sessions eventually lead to the emotional context fading away, showing pain for what it really is.

    It took time to learn the language of pain. Running out of breath, having sore muscles, or feeling anxiety before a performance is good pain. Sharp pain in joints or feeling of discomfort, leading to a crippling flight-or-fight response, is a different animal.

    Good pain keeps us wanting more of the experience. It motivates incremental growth by forming a habit of seeking that familiar feeling. Its bad cousin will cripple us if left unnoticed or overwhelm us, teaching hopelessness.

    The school of pain can’t be skipped. We can’t call in sick or cheat our way out of it. The teacher pain will keep calling our names until we show up for the lesson. Avoiding it would eventually cost more. It is feeding a bottled-up monster that one day turns into a formidable Godzilla.

    It’s pointless to hide from it. Just like Buddha found out about death, sickness, and old age despite his parents’ best efforts to shield him, we will all have to accept that it is ever-present in our lives.

    Walking a life journey made me realize that sometimes there is no other option but to face pain. As uncomfortable and frightening as it may be, if I don’t square up to the monster, it will never go away.

    The saying “the only way out is through” holds true. The next level of personal growth has to happen through discomfort. Though these victories may be invisible to everyone else, they are uniquely valuable to us.

    It may sound like I’ve mastered the art of facing the uncomfortable and I am no longer concerned about pain. That is not true. The lessons I get from pain are still challenging.

    As much as I don’t want to sit through hard lessons, I’ve learned to respect and heed pain’s presence. Knowing that becoming invincible to it is impossible, I’ve learned to recognize the challenge and see it as a catalyst for growth.

    Anticipating pain keeps me motivated to avoid its visits and learn on my own. I will probably never tolerate pain as some people do. I am probably wired that way. But nature can always be complemented by nurture. Resilience, acceptance, and embracing the suck make it valuable learning.

    In her influential book The Upside of Stress, psychologist Kelly McGonigal challenged conventional thinking that stress kills. The research shows that how we perceive stress can turn a negative into positive. Pain can be seen in the same way.

    We can’t pick and choose which parts of human experience we want to face. As tempting as it is to only eat the cherry on top of life’s cake, this will never make us appreciate life wholly. We need to accept all of it. Without pain, we do not know pleasure. Without the discomfort of ignorance, there is no bliss of knowledge.

  • Anxiety Sucks, But It Taught Me These 7 Important Things

    Anxiety Sucks, But It Taught Me These 7 Important Things

    “Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom.” ~Soren Kierkegaard

    Let’s be clear:

    This isn’t an article about positive thinking.

    This isn’t an article about how silver linings make everything okay.

    This isn’t an article about how your perspective on anxiety is all wrong.

    The kids call those things “toxic positivity.”

    No toxic positivity here.

    This is an article about my lifelong relationship with anxiety and what I’ve learned from something that won’t go away. At times the anxiety spikes and feels almost crippling. I have a hard time appreciating the learning at those times, but it’s still there.

    That is what this article is all about.

    Please do not confuse me learning things from something that won’t go away with me endorsing that thing or saying it’s a good thing. I would trade everything I’ve learned from anxiety for less anxiety. I don’t even like writing about it because focusing on it this much gives me anxiety. But I want to write things that help people.

    How a Bare Butt Sparked My Anxiety

    Stranger Things has shown how cool the eighties were. For the most part, this is true. I miss arcades and the music. I miss the freedom I had as a kid that I don’t see kids having these days. I miss some of the fashion. I don’t miss people not knowing anything about mental health.

    We used to play football every day after school at a baseball field/park in our little town. This was unsupervised tackle football with kids a lot older than me.

    I remember one time a guy broke his finger. It was pointing back at him at a ninety-degree angle. He took off sprinting toward his house. One of the older kids said, “He’s running home to mommy!” and we all went back to playing.

    Oddly enough, possibly breaking my finger didn’t worry me. What did worry me was one day when a kid was running for a touchdown, and another kid dove to stop him. He only caught the top of his pants, pulling them down and exposing his bare butt. He made the touchdown anyway, but while everyone else thought it was hilarious, it scared me to death.

    What if that happens to me?

    I started tying my pants up with a string every day, pulling it tight enough to make my stomach hurt (remember, this was the eighties—I was wearing those neon-colored pajama-pant-looking things). I started to feel sick before we played football, before school, and before everything.

    You would think it was obvious that I was dealing with anxiety, but you have to remember that in the eighties and nineties, we did not talk about mental health like we do now. We didn’t throw around terms like anxiety and depression. I was just the weird kid that threw up before he went to school.

    The anxiety has gotten a little more noticeable over the past few years. It seems to have gotten worse since having COVID in 2020 and 2021. I don’t know if that’s a thing, but it feels like it is. It has forced me to deal with it mindfully and with more intention. It’s never pleasant, but I’ve learned a few things.

    1. Anxiety has taught me to be present.

    The crushing presence of high anxiety forces me to be exactly where I am at that moment. I’m not able to read or write. I cannot play a video game or watch a movie with any kind of enjoyment. There’s nothing I can do.

    This roots me in the moment in a very intense, authentic way. That might seem bad since I’m anxious, but there’s another layer to it. When I can be completely present with the physiological sensations of anxiety, I recognize that they are energy in the body. When I’m super present, I can see how my mind is turning those sensations into the emotion we call anxiety, and that’s where my suffering comes from.

    2. Anxiety has taught me about control.

    I’ve been told that my hyper-independence and need to be prepared for anything is a trauma response. I was a therapist for ten years, and I still don’t know what to do with this information. I do know that anxiety gives me a crash course in what I can control and what I cannot control.

    The bad news is that I can’t control any of the things that I think are creating anxiety. The good news is that I can control my response to all those things. Anxiety forces me to do this in a very intentional way.

    Anxiety also puts my mind firmly on something bigger than myself. Maybe it’s that higher power we hear about in AA meetings and on award shows. It’s good for me to get outside my head and remember that I’m not in charge of anything. It’s helpful to only box within my weight class.

    3. Anxiety teaches me to have good habits and boundaries.

    I’m bad about allowing my habits and boundaries to slip when times are good. I start eating poorly, I stop exercising, I stay up too late, and I watch a bunch of shows and movies that beam darkness and distraction directly into my head.

    I also start to allow unhealthy and even toxic people to have a more prominent role in my life. This is all under the guise of helping them because people reach out to me a lot. Over the years, I’ve learned I have to limit how close I let the most toxic people get to me, no matter how much help they need.

    When I’m feeling good, I start thinking I can handle anything, and my boundaries slip. Anxiety is always a reminder that the unhealthiness in my life has consequences, and I clean house when it spikes.

    4. Anxiety reminds me how important growth is.

    Once I clean house, I start looking at new projects and things I can do to feel better. I start taking the next step in who I want to be. This has been difficult over the past three years because the waves of anxiety have been so intense, but I see the light at the end of the tunnel as the good habits I put in place and the new projects and things I started are beginning to come to fruition.

    I chose to let my counseling license go inactive and focus on life coaching because it’s less stressful, and I’m better at it. This would not have happened without anxiety. I have changed my diet and exercise in response to blood pressure and anxiety, and these are good habits to have whether I am anxious or not.

    5. Anxiety taught me to be gentle.

    I’ve written and spoken a lot about my desire to be gentler with people. I’m not unkind, and I have a lot of compassion for people, but this is often expressed gruffly or too directly. It’s how I was raised, and I often feel like I am patronizing people if I walk in verbal circles when I’m trying to help them with something.

    When I’m experiencing high anxiety I feel fragile, which helps me understand how other people might feel in the face of my bluntness. I started working on being gentler around 2018, and I was disappointed in my progress.

    It was also around that year that anxiety began to become a fixture in my life again. As I look back now, I can recognize that I am a lot gentler with everyone around me when I’m anxious. Being a little fragile helps me treat everybody else with a little more care.

    6. Anxiety taught me to slow down and ask for help.

    When I started experiencing increased anxiety, it led me to make quick decisions and change things to try to deal with it. This makes sense. Evolutionarily, anxiety is meant to prompt us to action.

    The problem was that these decisions rarely turned out to be my best ones and often led to other consequences I had to deal with down the line. Because of this, I’ve learned that an anxiety spike is not the time to make big decisions.

    If I have to make a decision about something, I slow down and try to be very intentional about it. I’ve also learned I need to talk it out with somebody else, something I’ve never been inclined to do. Asking for help is a good thing.

    7. Anxiety helps me speed up.

    Yeah, yeah, yeah, this is the opposite of what I just said.

    Let me clarify.

    One of the most important quotes I’ve ever read came from the folk singer Joan Baez: “Action is the antidote to anxiety.” (Years later, I learned she might have said despair instead of anxiety, but I heard it the first way).

    Some tasks bring anxiety that I do not want to deal with. These usually involve phone calls or emails to bureaucratic organizations or errands that I find unpleasant and anxiety-inducing (avoiding these also makes sense—our evolutionary legacy cannot understand why we would do something that may feel dangerous).

    Over the years, I’ve learned that anxiety diminishes if I take the steps I need to take to address these tasks. The cool thing is that this has translated over to many of my day-to-day tasks.

    By acting in the face of anxiety, I’ve gotten pretty good about doing things when they need to be done. I mow the lawn when it needs to be mowed, take out the trash when it needs to be taken out, put the laundry up when it needs to be put up, and get the oil changed in my truck when it needs to be changed.

    Once we start addressing tasks immediately, it becomes a habit. Anxiety helped me do this.

    Anxiety Still Sucks

    So there you go. Seven things anxiety has taught me. I’m grateful for these lessons, but they don’t make anxiety any less difficult in the moment.

    Anxiety is meant to suck. It’s meant to make things difficult and uncomfortable for us until we do something to address the problem. The problem, unfortunately, is often un-addressable these days.

    We worry about things like losing our job, not having enough money, divorce, and the general state of the world. Anxiety did not develop to address any of these things, so sometimes being comfortable with discomfort is the best we can offer ourselves.

    Maybe that’s the last thing anxiety is teaching me.

  • 3 Life-Changing Insights for Control Freaks (Lessons from an Ant Infestation)

    3 Life-Changing Insights for Control Freaks (Lessons from an Ant Infestation)

    “Freedom is what you do with what’s been done to you.”  ~Jean-Paul Sartre

    “So did you figure out what your shadow totem is?”

    This was the first thing out of my husband’s friend’s mouth as I sat down to dinner at a local downtown restaurant, across from my husband and a couple friends we were meeting up with.

    I laughed at the choice of question but then paused with wide eyes and replied, “YES, I DID! Oh my gosh. It’s an ant!”

    The backstory is that we had previously had a conversation about animal symbolism, and how figuring out what we identify with (spirit animal) or most fear (shadow totem) can help us gain deep insights into ourselves. I had no trouble with identifying my spirit animal—an eagle—but could not for the life of me pin down my shadow totem.

    As he asked that question that evening, a light bulb in my head went off. I had been battling a multi-week-long ant infestation in my home and it had become the bane of my existence. Every time I saw one of those suckers, I got triggered all over again. It ruined many days. So this made perfect sense! Ants are my shadow totem. But why??

    Upon reflection about this realization, I mulled over the meaning of this and was able to come away with some pretty incredible nuggets. Put simply, the ants struck me at my weakest point: my need for control.

    I know I’m not alone in this quirk—“control issues,” as a lot of us jokingly refer to them. But the truth is, if you’re saddled with this deep urge then you know you live your life on a high wire, trying to balance everything and keep it perfectly just so. And when you are thrown off, you take a pretty deep dive into mental chaos until you right the ship again. Okay, too many metaphors, but the point is, it sucks.

    Back to the ants. Days after the dinner I took time to think about the true meaning of them as my shadow totem. The insights I had about my control issues were not only helpful to me, but I bet will be the same for you!

    I was even able to identify three mindset adjustments as an accompaniment. I noticed they tend toward the Buddhist way of thinking but are just truly solid ways to approach life. So here we go!

    1. The ants were coming out of nowhere. And FROM ANYWHERE. It drove me nuts since I couldn’t identify the source of the problem.

    Insight:

    Upon reflection, I connected this to how I often feel like a sitting duck in life, just waiting for the next blow to come. The unpredictable nature of things feels like a constant threat. Also, I notice I often doggedly search for the “why” of things, but sadly am not always able to come up with an answer.

    I’ve felt this sentiment in many situations, ranging from the trivial to the most profound, with the latter being when I had a miscarriage. It was (as many of them are) not possible to tie to a definitive reason. In this case, my only true course of action (one easier said than done) was to accept and move forward.

    Mindset adjustment:

    Acceptance, though not a sexy response to the above, is really the best one. You’re gonna get ants in your house (especially when it’s in a green community built in 1936!).

    In life, you’re gonna get surprises. And not always happy ones. I once heard that if you can expect the unexpected, when it comes, you will accept it as an “old friend.” Sounds much better than treating life’s downs (the “ups” are more easily handled, right?!) as a monster under the bed.

    2. The dang ants were ruining my days. What a waste! But true.

    I felt silly with my outbursts, exclaiming expletives each time I came across one of those evil little things. My poor husband (who has the patience of a saint, zen master, and probably Jesus, combined!) hearing me from the next room. I didn’t want this for me (or him).

    Insight:

    Just like in my larger life, small things going wrong can really mess me up. The feeling of having a bad day rather than just keeping it a bad moment is one I am familiar with, unfortunately.

    Mindset adjustment:

    Enter mindfulness. This handy strategy allows for a sort of compartmentalization so we can fully be in the reality that is in front of us in the present moment. The truth is, the ants were really only in a couple rooms of the house, and I only encountered them for maybe a couple minutes out of my day. But MAN, you wouldn’t have known it!

    Attaching to our day being or staying a specific way is certain death. Okay, that’s extreme, but it’s cause for certain anxiety. And that’s no way to live this short life. Key principle: impermanence. Funnily enough, I have that word tattooed on me! In permanent ink… but is it “permanent”? I digress.

    3. I chose a treatment option for the ants, but still I walked around in a huff about it. I had done all I could do—why couldn’t I let it go?

    Insight:

    I frequently find myself ruminating on other things in life long after I had chosen a course of action. Sounds like a waste of mental, emotional, and even physical (if you’re pacing!) energy to me.

    Like when I made the decision to switch careers from business to education. Questions lingered, swirling in my head for quite some time after: “Is this a mistake?” “What if I want to change my mind again?” “Did I just waste my bachelor’s degree?” This made the path forward foggy and uncertain when what I needed was clarity and smooth sailing—which would have been afforded to me had I had self-trust at the time.

    Mindset adjustment:

    Hard as it is, the practice—keyword, PRACTICE—must be letting go with the knowledge that you can only do so much. There are so many sources of inspiration for this concept. Take your pick: The famous quote “Let go and let God” or  “Let it goooo” a la Frozen (any other parents in the house?). You get the idea.

    Also, add to the mantra list that nature will always win. This is true with the ants (spoiler alert, they came back) and with life in general, the universe on a broader scale. Think entropy. It’s everywhere in all ways. The sooner we align ourselves with the concept, the better!

    —

    I felt oddly grateful to the ants for the opportunity to reflect. It gave me a chance to gain insights that I (and maybe you!) otherwise would not have had. If you’re worried about us forgetting this wisdom, don’t be. Those little reminders (aka the ants) are always around the corner.

    Post-writing edit: Funny thing is, right after writing this, I walked into my bathroom and saw an ant making its way up the side of my mirror! Poetic, huh?

  • How to Ease the Pain of Being Human: From Breakdown to Breakthrough

    How to Ease the Pain of Being Human: From Breakdown to Breakthrough

    “Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know” ~Pema Chödrön

    We are all works in progress.

    We all have skeletons in our closets that we may wish to never come out. We have all made mistakes. We will all make mistakes in the future. We all have our scars.

    None of us are close to reaching that mythical ‘perfect’ status. Never will be.

    None of us should consider ourselves fully evolved. Not even close. There will always be space for improving an area of our lives.

    Truth be told, most of us are a contradictory mix of elements that make us, us. Life is not all black or white. There are many shades of grey in between.

    Being human isn’t always simple, tidy, or pretty. Being human involves trying to adapt to the ups, the downs, the challenges, the heartache, the struggles, the loss. We are given no manual on how to live our precious lives. No hacks or shortcuts will help us through some of the tough times.

    Breakdown or Breakthrough? Personal Challenges and Scars of Battle

    I want to share a story here that I have not shared elsewhere in writing.

    Over the course of a few months, at the end of 2021 and into early 2022, I had what can rightfully be described as a full-blown breakdown.

    Over this period, I was cloaked in a blanket of darkness, seemingly of my own making.

    The breakdown had me in a sleep-deprived, paranoid state where I started to have auditory hallucinations (i.e., hearing voices). At certain points I convinced myself I was tapped into some paranormal world and able to communicate through my mind with others that were trying to harm me and my loved ones.

    I was normally a considered and pretty thoughtful person, but my mind had started to work against me.

    This is the first, and hopefully last, time anything like this has happened to me. I have had no such experiences like this in the past, not even close.

    Scariest of all, at the time, to me at least, this experience seemed to come as a total bolt from the blue.

    In retrospect, however, the signs something was coming were there. I just failed to see them or heed their warning in real time.

    What happened?

    I was burnt out emotionally and physically. I had been running on cortisol and stress for too long, and my body had enough. My subconscious had enough. So they started to shut down on me in the most unexpected and alarming of ways.

    Subsequent internal work I have done also indicates that I had tried to repress emotions, including anger and sadness, without fully dealing with them. Some of these feelings had festered for a long time, so they came back to me to let me know they were not quite done with me.

    Dealing with Pressure

    Writing is a passion for me, but it only pays some of my bills. My other career is acting as an independent consultant to organizations that need help delivering and simplifying projects and increasing performance in existing teams.

    This work is often high-pressure and time-bound. Alongside this, I can also put myself under pressure even if my clients do not. Doing my job well is important to me, but sometimes my own expectations of what I can do can bite back at me.

    For a series of many months before the mental health episode, I had been pushing hard, without letting up. Running toward a finish line that kept moving.

    I had started to hold tension in my body (chest tight, shoulders hunched, breath shallow). My body was giving me clear signs it was not happy, but still I pushed through.

    My energy was not where it should be. A general sense of fatigue and tiredness followed me, however early I went to bed. My enthusiasm for things I normally enjoyed started to wane. I became more agitated, irritable, and quick to blow my fuse.

    I was feeling like I needed a break. Not just wanting one but really feeling I needed one. A long break, at that.

    These signs were all there. What did I do? I tried to push through them, push harder. I tried to repress them, believing I could just tough them out. Drink more coffee. Push. Meet the next deadline. Push. The team needs me. Push. The client needs me. Push.

    Rather than acknowledging my body and mind were telling me they needed deep rest, not just the weekend off, I pushed on. And I paid a heavy price. But I was lucky because it could have been heavier. For other people it is heavier if they are unable to escape this cycle.

    Coming Out the Other Side

    Where am I now?

    I am pleased to say I got that rest I needed (I took three months off to travel). I sought professional help in the guise of a therapist (not something I ever thought I would need) and other healthcare professionals.

    I leaned on my wife and family for support rather than believing I had to do this all alone. I shared my struggle with friends.

    I doubled down on my efforts to take my self-care practices seriously. I introduced new self-care techniques into my life (breathing techniques, formal meditation, as well as walking meditations). I now make this time a priority in my life.

    I took, and continue to take, a hard look at my life to shed what was not serving me in a positive way. Peeling back layers of conditioning. Trying to understand myself more fully. Trying to identify and acknowledge triggers more acutely so I could explore what they might be telling me.

    I now feel more energized. I got my spark back. I get excited about the things that used to excite me again, like music, writing, exercising, being in nature, and taking long walks.

    In short, I feel like myself again.

    While I do not want to be defined by that singular experience, I also do not want to forget the lessons it holds. I want the experience to make me stronger, not break me. Part of that means accepting that this did happen to me. And it could happen to any of us. How I respond is now up to me. And I am determined to respond in a positive fashion by making changes that will serve me in the future.

    I was lucky. Others are not so fortunate.

    Making Our Way in Life

    The inconvenient truth is that life is struggle. Life can be hard. We will all face significant challenges. None of us can escape that.

    Yours will be different than mine, but you will face your own demons at times.

    So what can we do?

    We can do our best to put one foot in front of the other and make progress—understanding that sometimes that progress will be slow, sometimes the steps forward will be small, and sometimes we will also feel stuck. Sometimes just not losing ground is the win we need most.

    We can try to learn lessons from the past but commit to the now. Focusing on developing and supporting our future selves. Focusing on being true to ourselves.

    We can celebrate our successes, large and small.

    We can be grateful for all we have.

    We can live a life of contribution, finding small ways to be of service to the world around us in our own unique way. We can find purpose and value in our days.

    We can invest in our own development so we have the necessary internal tools to support us in living our best lives. We can adopt practices that support us living this type of life.

    We can take our self-care seriously. Planning and making time for techniques that serve us. We can commit to protecting this time as the valuable investment it is, understanding that, to help and show up for others, we must first show up for ourselves.

    We can lean on others when we need to. Not seeing this as a weakness to be avoided but as a necessary component of the human condition. We can lean into our ‘tribe.’

    We can continue to learn and be curious about our own emotional state and feelings, asking ourselves questions: Why do we feel a certain way? What are our emotions telling us? Is this just a passing feeling, or is it really trying to tell us something or protect us in some way?

    We can get to know ourselves on a deeper level.

    We can embrace the light, share our light, and be a light for others.

    We can love and live the best way we know how.

    We can try to make peace with the fact that to struggle is to be human. The journey isn’t easy for any of us, but there is much reward and joy to be found along the way.

  • How Yoga Helped Heal My Anxiety and Quiet My Overactive Mind

    How Yoga Helped Heal My Anxiety and Quiet My Overactive Mind

    “The privilege of a lifetime is to become who you really are” ~Carl Jung

    Yoga is often celebrated for its physical benefits: greater flexibility, increased strength, improved circulation, and so on. But nothing could have prepared me for the transformational effect that yoga has had on my mental health and well-being.

    I was diagnosed with anxiety and depression when I was fourteen, and I have struggled with both for most of my life. My mind was my worst enemy, constantly worrying and criticizing to the point where it became hard to do anything. Even the things I really wanted to do became too overwhelming.

    I knew about the positive impact of exercise and healthy living on mental health, and I had dabbled in yoga classes at the gym for years in an attempt to drag myself out of this hole I was in.

    I did notice some small changes in my mood and energy levels. I couldn’t explain it, but I would always feel a certain buzz after a great yoga class.

    So, in 2022, I decided to take this yoga thing seriously. I began practicing daily and even studied for a yoga teacher training qualification.

    Since then, I have noticed significant changes in not only my physical body and well-being but in my mental health too. Most notably, my anxiety levels have significantly decreased. Of course, I still have moments of anxiety, but I feel better equipped to cope with them and less likely to allow them to pull me into a downward spiral.

    Disclaimer: This is not medical health advice; it is simply my own experience. If you are struggling with your mental health, please seek a medical health professional.

    How Yoga Can Help with Anxiety

    Yoga helps you recognize your emotions and triggers.

    The first thing to know about yoga is that it is not a series of complicated poses used to make you look a certain way or increase your flexibility.

    Instead, it is an inner practice where we unite our body, mind, and spirit and become one with the universal life force energy that sustains all of life.

    Meditation and breathwork are just as important parts of yoga as the poses (known as asana).

    With this knowledge, yoga has the power to transform your mental state from a place of stress and anxiety to complete peace with yourself and the world around you.

    It allows you to notice how you’re feeling and what you’re thinking without judging yourself. It allows you to understand your body, how it works, and what messages it’s trying to communicate to you about your health and your needs.

    By learning to recognize when I felt anxious and why, yoga provided a safe space to release those triggers and emotions that I would ordinarily suppress.

    Yoga regulates your nervous system.

    When we experience high levels of anxiety, we are constantly living in fight-or-flight mode. The fight-or-flight response is designed to switch on in moments of danger and stress to protect you and then return to homeostasis once the threat has gone.

    However, in this day and age, many people are experiencing an overactive fight-or-flight response due to an increasingly stressful lifestyle. And many live in a constant state of hypervigilance as a result of trauma or abuse.

    Living in fight-or-flight mode takes up an enormous amount of energy, and our bodies cannot keep up with the demands long term. Over time, the body and mind begin to shut down and we get illness and disease as a result.

    This is what happened to me. My body could not cope with the pressure I was putting it under daily, so my mental health suffered.

    Practicing yoga allows you to calm your nervous system and creates a space where the mind and body feel safe to exit fight-or-flight mode and actually relax.

    One way to do this is through practicing breathwork, also known as pranayama.

    Yogic philosophy believes that the breath is how we can harness our energy and the energy of the universe. We can alter our emotions, energy levels, and even physiological responses, such as the fight-or-flight response, with just the breath.

    When I notice I am starting to feel anxious, I breathe deeply into my stomach for the count of four, hold it for four, and then slowly exhale for the count of four, also known as belly breathing.

    While this may sound trivial, it really helps me to feel calm in moments of stress and anxiety.

    Breathing slowly and deeply activates our parasympathetic nervous system. This sends signals to the brain that there is no danger here and the fight-or-flight response does not need to be activated.

    Yoga teaches you new coping mechanisms.

    Yoga taught me different techniques to cope with my anxiety and panic attacks.

    Firstly, yoga teaches that you are not your mind. You are not your thoughts, your beliefs, or even your body.

    When we study the five koshas (layers of the self) we can see our physical being is just a vehicle to navigate this world in; it is not who we are as a whole. For example, the koshas teach us that our essence cannot be entirely in our physical body because physical bodies are subject to change, yet who we are remains.

    This mindset applies to our thoughts too. Once I started acknowledging that my thoughts did not always come from me, they began to hold less weight. Most of our thoughts are just ‘re-runs’ of things we are told as a child or things we repeatedly hear from society that get internalized. They are not necessarily representative of who we truly are.

    This knowledge allowed me to distance myself from my anxious thoughts instead of letting them consume me.

    Secondly, through pranayama and meditation, both essential aspects of yoga, I learned to recognize how I was feeling and allow those feelings to exist within me, without trying to change them or distract myself from them.

    When we don’t allow our emotions space to be there, we are instead rejecting that aspect of ourselves. We push these feelings deeper and deeper down as a way to avoid dealing with them, without realizing we are actually ingraining them deeper into our psyche.

    By giving our emotions space to be felt, we can release them from our mind and body so we don’t have to carry them with us through our life.

    Yoga helps you be more present.

    To practice yoga, you need to be focused and in the present moment. To hold balance poses like tree pose or to get into the correct alignment of warrior 1, you need to be paying attention to what is happening around you right now.

    If your mind drifts while you’re holding a balance pose, you can bet your body will lose all balance too.

    Yoga forces you to be in the present moment, to be fully engaged in what you are doing, and doesn’t allow room to think about anything else.

    For me, this is exactly what I needed to get out of my anxiety-ridden head. One of my main struggles with anxiety was that I could not stop myself from thinking. The incessant noise of my own mind was exhausting to live with.

    However, when I am in a yoga flow, the noise stops. The mind chatter about future scenarios that will probably never happen is no longer there, as I am using all my focus to get into the proper alignment of the pose.

    The more you practice focusing, the easier it is to apply this in your daily life. I can now notice when my mind is overactive and instead re-direct it to the task at hand. By giving our full attention to the thing we are doing, we can quieten that anxious voice within and begin to enjoy the present moment.

    —

    Yoga has so many incredible benefits physically, mentally, and spiritually. Since sticking to a consistent yoga practice, I have noticed my anxiety decrease dramatically and I am able to live a full and happy life without my mind controlling me.

  • How I’m Overcoming Codependency and the Need to Prove My Worth

    How I’m Overcoming Codependency and the Need to Prove My Worth

    “Everywhere you go, there you are.” ~Unknown

    I have heard this quote many times throughout life, but that was it. I heard it, thought hmm, and moved on. Well, here I am at the age of thirty-nine, and I am really starting to see and understand it.

    I first started noticing this idea showing up over and over again recently, at a time of a change in my career. I went from an ER nurse to an RN in the transfer center. So bedside nursing to office work.

    I noticed one day, as I was sitting in my new, quiet office area looking at the board of the ER in epic (which shows how many patients are currently in the emergency room), there were about ninety-eight patients in a forty-four-bed unit. I felt as if I was actually in the ER. I felt horrible on the inside, and felt sorry for the patients, nurses, doctors, etc.

    Then I thought, What the hell am I doing? I am in an office; I am not down in the ER. If I am going to experience the same feelings in this office as I would have in the ER, then why did I change jobs?

    It was at that moment that I was like Katie, you got to heal this wound. Whatever it is, you got to heal it.

    I took a deep breath and consciously chose not to feel that way. I decided to acknowledge that there were long wait times, that workers were overwhelmed, and that patients may not get the care they needed due to the hospital being saturated.

    In that moment I chose to be thankful that I was not one of them. I chose to feel better. I chose to celebrate that I had stepped out of an environment that was unhealthy for me.

    Another time it happened was when we were working on a stroke transfer. Everyone was rush, rush, rush.

    I felt my face get flushed; my chest tightened. The fear and worry were taking over. I thought to myself, What the hell, Katie. You are doing it again. You are feeling as if you are in an emergency room at the bedside. Calm down. Remember, if you are going to feel the feelings you felt in the ER, you should have just stayed in the ER.

    Once again, I took a deep breath. I reminded myself that I am only one person. I was doing all that I could do, as fast as I could, and that was enough. I reminded myself that I don’t have a magic wand and can’t teleport anyone in an instant. I felt better but was really starting to have an awareness of “Everywhere you go, there you are.”

    This happened again on a day of consistent work in the transfer center. I did try to be creative, do some swapping of patients, but, ultimately, all my work led nowhere.

    As I was sending out my email that shows transfers that were complete, it read “zero.” I had thoughts like Omg, they are going to think I did not do anything today. I did not help the ER at all. They have thirty-three admits, and I got no one moved from the hospital.

    The truth is I did my best. There were things out of my control that inhibited the movement.

    At that moment of frustration, I heard in my head, once again, “Everywhere you go, there you are.”

    I started talking about how I was feeling with one of my friends and coworkers. He asked me if I was familiar with codependency, I’m guessing because he could see the signs in me.

    It made me laugh because codependency is definitely something I am working on overcoming. Everywhere I go, there you are, codependency. It does not just show up in relationships; it shows up in all areas of my life.

    In my work, it showed in how I looked to validate my importance by the number of transfers out of the hospital I made, even though there are so many factors involved in transfers, most of them out of my control.

    In my personal relationships, it showed in how I aimed to please everyone but myself, ultimately to feel worthy based on their approval.

    According to Psychology Today, codependency is “a dysfunctional relationship dynamic where one person assumes the role of the giver, sacrificing their own needs for the sake of others.”

    This, in my opinion, is what’s happening in healthcare. So many healthcare providers give, give, give but only receive a paycheck. That is not sustainable, not satisfying to the individual or their spirit.

    Do you find that you often feel responsible and overly invested in the lives of others, abandoning your feelings, thoughts, and identity; feel guilty for asking for a break or just sitting for a minute; have poor boundaries or no boundaries with your friends, family, coworkers, and clients? If so, it might be a good idea to take the time to reflect and see if you are codependent.

    Self-awareness and understanding what role you play in feeling burned out or dissatisfied can lead to a much more fulfilling life and career.

    Pay attention to your thoughts, emotions, and feelings. They are powerful messengers. Take the time to be curious about your reactions and your triggers. When you replace judgment with curiosity, you create space in your brain to learn.

    As I reflect on my nursing career, I have a feeling that many people, especially in healthcare, struggle with codependency. I think perhaps we create most of our problems from unhealthy patterns developed in childhood.  For example, I learned young to neglect my needs, please other people instead of speaking up for myself, and suppress and deny how I felt.

    So, what was I really feeling in that moment—the moment when I felt guilty that there were no transfers? I was feeling like a letdown. I was feeling like I wasn’t good enough, and why? Old habits are hard to break, but I am thankful now because I have awareness. With awareness I can do better, create new habits, and break old patterns. I can pay attention to what follows me everywhere I go.

    Tomorrow is my last day as an RN. I am stepping out on faith and wanting to create a new life and career for myself.

    I am not expecting all rainbows and sunshine. I am aware now that as I embark on this journey there are going to be thoughts, feelings, and emotions that are going to follow me everywhere I go.

    I am going to have to remind myself not to make choices based on the need for validation. I might get insecure when I get just one like on something I posted on social media, or I might worry that my son won’t like me if I don’t buy him everything he wants.

    But I have to remind myself not to allow views and likes to determine my worth, and I also have to remember it’s more important to set a good example for my kid than to win his approval.

    It all starts with questioning my thoughts and trying to get to the root of my behavior.

    With awareness I can grow, heal, and become the person I am destined to be. Perfectly imperfect.

  • 30 Simple Mindfulness Practices to Help You Focus and Be Present

    30 Simple Mindfulness Practices to Help You Focus and Be Present

    “The present moment is filled with joy and happiness. If you are attentive, you will see it.” ~Thích Nhất Hạnh, Peace is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life

    Do you ever feel like you’re too busy for meditation?

    You understand the benefits, and you’d really like to commit to it. But you’re a busy person. You have deadlines to meet, food to prepare, bills to pay, kids to raise, family members to call—and even that’s barely scratching the surface.

    We’ve all been there. I certainly have.

    Before I found mindfulness, I struggled with concentration for years. When I moved away from home to make a living as a freelance writer and travel the world, it only got worse.

    Suddenly I was the other side of the globe, with no family and often no friends.

    I should have been looking forward to the next exciting meal, going out and meeting interesting new people, or just appreciating the sights and sounds of an unfamiliar city. Instead, without the structure that I was accustomed to at home, I was stuck in a perpetual state of work-related anxiety.

    As the stress continued to build, I got the uncomfortable feeling that I was squandering the opportunity of a lifetime. I was never fully committed to either work or play, and as I result I wasn’t able to appreciate either.

    I knew I had to do something.

    So I tried to throw myself into meditation. But I could never keep it up. I’d do two or three days in a row, then I’d skip one, then two, then a week, and suddenly I’d give up.

    Then I read about mindfulness. I found that I didn’t need to take a big chunk out of my time out to practice it.

    I could be mindful at any time and just fit it into my normal day-to-day activities. A moment here, a moment there, and surprisingly quickly it became a habit. I was calmer, more focused, and my mental health was improving.

    And what happened next was a shock.

    One morning a few months later I sat down to meditate. I set my alarm for twenty minutes, focused on my breath, and followed through till my alarm buzzed. But it was different. It was a lot easier than I remembered.

    It felt normal—natural even. So I did the same the next day, and the next, till I’d gone a month meditating every single day. Small daily mindfulness practices had ended up being a perfect stepping stone to longer meditation sessions.

    A few months later a friend of mine was struggling with his work, much in the same way I had. I wanted to see how I could help, so I wrote him an email listing each and every way that I had tried to bring mindfulness into my life. The ideas below are an extension of our conversation.

    I hope they make as big a difference to your life as they have done mine.

    How to Use These Practices to Cultivate Laser-Sharp Focus

    Think of each situation as a trigger to bring you back to the present moment. You definitely don’t have to start with all of them; in fact, I’d start by choosing three or four to practice. Then try adding one a week until you can incorporate all of them into your life.

    1. Waking up.

    As soon as you wake up, before you get out of bed, take three deep breaths. This will have the double benefit of quietening your mind and giving your brain an oxygen boost to get you out of bed.

    2. Getting out of bed.

    Not all of us have time for yoga. But we all have time to stretch. When you first stand, take a deep breath in and stretch your hands as high as you can toward the ceiling, fingers pointing straight up. Then as you breathe out, relax, lean forward, and try to touch your toes. Make sure to focus on your breathing and the sensations of the stretch.

    3. Making your bed.

    Making your bed first thing in the morning is a great opportunity to practice mindfulness. Try to be completely engaged in the activity, putting all your attention into the folding of the sheets.

    4. Showering.

    As you take a shower, spend a minute or two just feeling the water on your skin; notice the temperature, the pressure, and the sounds as it falls.

    5. Getting dressed.

    Most of us rush to get our clothes on, but when you get dressed in the morning, take a second to pay attention to the way they feel on your skin, the texture of the material, and the warmth that they provide.

    6. Boiling the kettle.

    Instead of running around the house and trying to do everything before the kettle boils, sit quietly and listen intently to the water bubble or the kettle whistle.

    7. Drinking tea or coffee.

    When you drink tea of coffee, sip slowly and be mindful of the taste, temperature, and subtle effect it has on your body.

    8. Brushing your teeth.

    We all (hopefully) do this. So it’s a great place to start focusing on the present moment.

    9. Listen to music.

    Listening to some relaxing music before you leave the house in the morning is a great way to center yourself. Completely immerse yourself in the song. Be aware of the volume, cadence, tempo, the uniqueness of the sounds.

    10. Writing a to-do list by hand.

    Whether you do this first thing in the morning or last thing at night, creating a to-do list can quell anxieties and bring your attention to exactly what you have to do throughout the day. Using an old-fashioned pen and paper will help you be more mindful then will typing it in your phone or computer.

    11. Running.

    Leave your music at home and just pay attention to the sounds of whatever is around you as you run. You might want to focus on the rhythm of your feet as they hit the ground.

    12. Touching your hair.

    Next time you catch yourself running your hands through your hair, pay attention how it feels in your hands. Is it soft, spikey, curly, wavy?

    13. Stopping at a red light.

    A lot of us get angry, nervous or tense when we drive. Every time you stop at a red light, take a deep breath and try to relax any tension you might be holding in your jaw, neck or shoulders.

    14. When waiting.

    Whenever you find yourself waiting, whether it be for a meeting, at a bus stop, or an appointment, try to relax all the muscles in your face—your jaw, your brows, your eyelids.

    15. Walking.

    As you’re walking down the street, pay attention to how your legs and feet feel against the ground. Check your breathing. It’s common to breathe shallow when you’re in public, so make sure you’re still breathing through your diaphragm.

    16. Hugging or handshakes.

    No one likes a cold hug. Make sure the first person you hug or shake hands with today feels like you gave it your complete attention instead of feeling like your mind was somewhere else.

    17. Exercising.

    At the gym, be completely focused on whatever exercise you are doing. You can let your mind wander when you’re taking a break, but throughout the exercise itself, be focused entirely on the practice.

    18. Eating lunch.

    At lunchtime, take a bite out of your food and chew it slowly. Be mindful of the texture; is it crunchy or soft? Taste; is it spicy, bitter, sweet, or sour? Temperature; is it hot, cold, or just lukewarm?

    19. Talking to someone.

    Try to be completely present in conversation, making eye contact and listening to what they say without thinking about what you want to add next or where you’re going to be later.

    20. At your desk.

    If you work at a desk and catch yourself slouching, take a deep breath, sit up straight, and relax the muscles in your face, your neck, and finally your shoulders.

    21. Set a phone alarm.

    A lot of people see technology as a hindrance to mindfulness, and that’s true to an extent. But we can use things like phone alarms to remind us to spend a few seconds bringing our awareness back to our breath throughout the day.

    22. Follow an insect.

    Yep. You may feel like a child, but that’s a good thing—children live in the present. If you see an insect, forget everything else around you and watch how it moves for a few seconds. Be aware that it’s a living being just like you.

    23. Getting home at night.

    When you walk through the door to your house or apartment, pause and think about how grateful you are to be home. Whether it’s cold outside, and you’ve just walked into warmth, or you’re returning home to someone you love – there’s always something to appreciate.

    24. Taking off your shoes.

    We all like to take our shoes off after a long day. Pay attention to how your feet feel on the ground, try to move your toes around and feel each one individually.

    25. Cooking.

    Cooking offers a variety of ways to be mindful. You can hone your attention in on your own movements, the sounds in the kitchen, the taste of the food you are preparing, or the aromas of the different spices as they cook.

    26. Watching T.V.

    A lot of us work anxiously all day, and when we get some leisure time end up too distracted to truly enjoy it. If you’re watching T.V try to be fully present to what you’re watching, as opposed to half-heartedly talking to a loved one or browsing through your phone.

    27. Vacuuming.

    Counter-intuitive, I know—this isn’t for everyone. But focusing on the noise of the vacuum can be effective because it often drowns out any other sensory distractions.

    28. At dinner.

    Think about the ingredients that have gone into your meal—where have they come from? If it’s fish, for example, imagine the fisherman catching it at sea, bringing it to the docks, and selling it to local farmers markets.

    29. At least five minutes of Do Nothing Time (DNT).

    No checking your phone. No reading a newspaper. Don’t even try to meditate. Just sit there, and if any feelings come up—discomfort, restlessness, or even guilt that you’re not doing anything—just embrace them. Most of the time we’re so wrapped up in doing something ‘productive’ that it’s difficult to just sit still and do nothing.

    30. Lying in bed.

    Before you go to sleep, take a moment to think of one thing you were grateful for that day, no matter how big or small, or how difficult the day was. This will condition your mind for positivity, and help you sleep better.

    As you start to see the benefits of these daily practices, you’ll feel more focused, energized, and you can move on to longer focused meditation sessions. Start taking a few moments out of your day to practice mindfulness now, and you’ll enjoy the rewards for years to come.

    Do you have any experience with some of these practices? Let us know in the comments!

  • 8 Things Not to Say to Someone Who’s Struggling with Anxiety

    8 Things Not to Say to Someone Who’s Struggling with Anxiety

    Anxiety

    “Sometimes just being there is enough.” ~Unknown

    It felt like I couldn’t breathe. Like someone was holding me by the neck, against a wall, and the floor might drop beneath us at any moment.

    I’m describing a panic attack, but this has actually happened to me before—being held by the neck against a wall, that is, not the other part. Growing up I experienced many moments like that, moments when I felt unsafe, physically and emotionally.

    There were countless experiences that reinforced to me, over the years, that I couldn’t let my guard down, because at any moment I could be hurt.

    So I learned to be constantly anxious, eternally on guard, ever ready for a threat. I learned to be tightly wound, my fight-or-flight response permanently triggered.

    And I learned to see minor threats as major problems, because that’s another thing I learned as a kid: Sometimes seemingly small things could make other people snap.

    Unsurprisingly, I grew into an adult who snapped over small things all the time.

    Got bleach on my interview outfit? No one will ever hire me now!

    She doesn’t want to be my friend? Why doesn’t anyone love me?

    Found a suspicious lump? I’m going to die!

    Okay, so that last one isn’t actually a “small thing,” but the point is I was constantly scared. Life was a string of lions to tame, and I lived in a land without chairs.

    I believe my early experiences, being mistreated in varied environments, led to my years of depression and anxiety. For you or your loved one, there may be other causes.

    Some people are genetically predisposed to anxiety, some struggle because of stressful circumstances, and for some, physical conditions play a role.

    But this isn’t a post about what causes anxiety. This is a post about what not to say when someone’s panicking.

    Anxiety can completely overwhelm your mind and body, and we often exacerbate our pain by being cruel to ourselves in our head.

    “Get it together!” we scream at ourselves. “What’s wrong with you? Why are you such a mess?”

    But none of these thoughts are helpful. Though the people who love us are generally not as cruel, they sometimes say less than helpful things, as well, solely because they don’t know any better.

    Even as someone who has experienced anxiety, I have said some of the things below to others because it feels powerless to see someone struggling. And when you feel powerless, it’s hard to think straight.

    All you know is that you want to fix it for them. You want to have answers. But sometimes when we’re in fix-it mode, despite our best intentions, we inadvertently add fuel to the fire.

    So, as someone who’s been on both sides of the coin, I’d like to share some phrases to avoid when someone is dealing with anxiety, and offer a little insight into what actually helps.

    Things Not to Say to Someone Who’s Struggling with Anxiety

    1. What you’re stressing about won’t even matter in a year.

    In many cases, this is true. If someone’s worrying about a minor car accident, it’s entirely likely what they’re stressing about won’t really matter in the grand scheme of things. But this isn’t a universally true statement.

    A minor accident could lead to major car trouble, which could lead to missing work, which could lead to lost pay, which could lead to getting evicted. And that could very well matter in a year. Is this chain of events likely? No, but it’s still possible.

    It’s not reassuring to tell someone the worst-case scenario won’t happen because sometimes, it does. But more importantly, in that moment when someone is in the midst of anxiety, it feels catastrophic, and you can’t rationalize those feelings away—at least not immediately.

    When someone is panicking, they don’t need logic; they need validation. They need validation that yes, life is uncertain and “bad” things do happen, and validation that it’s okay to feel scared.

    They also need a reminder that in this moment, they are safe. And that’s all they need to think about right now: breathing and grounding themselves in this moment in time.

    2. Life’s too short to worry. 

    All this does is create more anxiety, because in addition to whatever that person was initially stressing about, they now have to worry that they’re missing out on life because of an emotional response that feels beyond their control.

    Yes, life is short. And we all naturally want to make the most of it. But you wouldn’t tell a diabetic “Life is too short to have too much sugar in your blood.” Sure, you’d encourage them to make healthy food choices, but you’d realize this phrasing would vastly oversimplify the effort required from them to manage their condition and maintain healthy habits.

    The same is true of anxiety. Anyone who’s struggled with it understands there are far better ways to live, and this knowledge pains them. What they may not know is how to help themselves.

    3. Calm down.

    “Calm down” is the goal, not the action step. It’s what we all want to do when we’re panicking. It’s the shore in the distance, and it can feel miles away as we gasp for air in the undertow of emotion and struggle to stay afloat.

    If you know any good methods that help you calm yourself—deep breathing exercises, for example—by all means, share them. But it’s probably best not to get into much detail in the moment when someone is panicking.

    Imagine someone hanging off a cliff, about to fall into a pit full of tigers. That’s what anxiety can feel like.

    If you were to stand at the edge and scream, “COME TO YOGA WITH ME TOMORROW! DID YOU KNOW THAT YOGA CAN HELP YOU…” that person would likely be too consumed by their terror to hear you your convincing argument.

    What they need to hear in that moment is “Take my hand!” And the same is true of anxiety. Hold their hand. Help them breathe. Help them come back into the moment. Then, when they feel safe, that’s a good time to tell them what’s helped you.

    That’s another important thing to remember: We all want to hear what’s helped other people deal, not what someone who’s never experienced our struggles has read about. Share your experience, not your expertise. None of us need a guru; we need friends who aren’t afraid to be vulnerable.

    4. It’s no big deal. 

    This comes back to the first point: In that moment, it feels like a big deal. A very big deal. It feels like the biggest, scariest, worst thing that could happen, and you can’t turn that fear off like a switch.

    When someone says, “It’s not a big deal,” the anxious mind translates this as “You’re overreacting—which is further proof that you’re broken.”

    Instead, try, “I know it’s hard. And scary. But you’re not alone. I’m here to help you get through this.”

    It’s amazing how much it helps when someone reinforces that it’s okay to be scared—it’s human, even—but we don’t have to face it alone.

    5. It’s all in your head. 

    Yes, thoughts and fears all originate in our head, but that doesn’t make our feelings any less real. The anxious mind translates “It’s all in your head” as “Your head is defective,” because knowing that thoughts fuel anxiety doesn’t make it any easier to stop thinking anxious thoughts.

    When we’re thinking anxious thoughts, what we need is a reminder that they often arise naturally—for all of us. We don’t need to worry about changing them. We just need to practice accepting them when they arise and disengaging from them.

    So try this instead: “I can understand why you’re thinking those thoughts. I’d probably think some of the same things if I were in your shoes. If you want, you can tell me all your anxious thoughts. They’re trying to protect you in their own way, so maybe they just need to be heard and then they’ll quiet a bit.”

    6. Let it go.

    I have, over the years, written many posts with advice on letting go. I believe it’s healthy to strive to let go of anger, resentment, fears, the past, and anything else that compromises our ability to be happy and loving in the present.

    I think, though, letting go is something we may need to do repeatedly. It’s a practice, not a one-time decision, and certainly not something we’re well equipped to do in a moment when we’re gripped by fear.

    Jon Kabat-Zinn wrote, “It’s not a matter of letting go—you would if you could. Instead of ‘Let it go’ we should probably say ‘Let it be’.”

    That’s what we need in the moment when we’re panicking: We need to give those feelings permission to exist. We need to give ourselves permissions to be a human being experiencing those feelings. And we need to know the people around us love us enough to accept us as we are—even if it might make them feel more comfortable if we were better able to just “let it go.”

    7. Things could be so much worse.

    Yes, things could always be worse, we all know this. Like many statements on this list, this phrase does little other than evoke guilt. And for the anxious mind, guilt can lead to more anxiety.

    Now, on top of their initial fears, they’re worrying that they’re not a good person because they can’t rationalize their anxiety away with gratitude.

    I’m not suggesting that it never helps to put things in perspective, but coming from someone else, this almost always sounds condescending. Condescension leads most of us to feel inferior, and it’s even worse when we’re already feeling ashamed because of our struggle, as many of us do.

    8. Be positive. 

    Anxiety isn’t just about negativity. For many of us, like me, it’s a learned response from a traumatic past in which we felt persistently unsafe. You can train your brain to be more optimistic, and in doing so, minimize anxious thoughts. But this involves far more time, effort, and support than the phrase “be positive” conveys.

    Also, “be positive” suggests that “positive” is something one can become—permanently—which ignores the reality that lows are inevitable in life. No one is positive all the time, and often the people who seem to be are actually being passive-aggressive.

    Phrases like “Look on the bright side” and “See the glass as half full” can seem incredibly patronizing when you’re hurting. They minimize just how hard it can be to see the world optimistically, especially when you’ve experienced trauma.

    So instead, show them what it looks like to be positive. Be loving and open and calm and accepting and supportive and present. This probably won’t heal them of their struggle or banish their anxiety in the moment when they’re panicking, but it’s amazing how you can affect someone for the better by being a healthy mirror.

    —

    After reading this list, you might think I’m suggesting there is no way to heal from anxiety; we just need to help people accept it and get through it. But that’s not actually my point.

    There are tools out there to help people. You can find some of them here. (I personally recommend therapy, yoga, and meditation, as these three tools combined have helped me learn to better regulate my emotions.)

    My point is that even when someone is making the efforts to help themselves, it takes time, they may still struggle, and in those moments, they simply need love, acceptance, and, support.

    We all do—even you, loved one who tries your best and has only the best intentions.

    If you’ve said some of these things in the past, know that we recognize you’re imperfect, just like us, but we still appreciate all that you do. We also appreciate that you read articles like this to better understand and support us.

    The world can be a scary place, but knowing that people, like you, care enough to help us makes it feel a whole lot safer.

  • Becoming Less Reactive

    Becoming Less Reactive

  • How to Make Things Better When It Seems Like Everything Is Going Wrong

    How to Make Things Better When It Seems Like Everything Is Going Wrong

    “You can never be happy if you’re trapped in the past and fearful of the future. Living in the present is the only way to be happy.” ~Unknown

    Have you found that the local and world events of the last couple of years have taken their toll on you and your family and friends? With fires, floods, shortages of food, fuel, and medicine, illnesses, job losses, and more, all occurring in a short space of time, it can be hard to find anyone who has not been affected in some way.

    Many people are experiencing feelings of hopelessness and living in constant fear about the future. And unfortunately, if not managed, over time these feelings can lead to depression, anxiety, and numerous other health conditions.

    We’ve all heard that a build-up of stress hormones in our body contributes to illness, but how can we possibly improve our health when we are living in survival mode and feel like the situation is hopeless?

    I lived this way for most of my life, wishing I could clone myself a million times so I could get on with changing the world, but feeling sad and frustrated knowing that I could not, no matter how hard I tried.

    I was also in my own little bubble of survival, working way too many hours to prove to myself I could be a mum and have a career and save the world, all while my health was deteriorating.

    From time to time I found myself thinking, why is it that no matter how hard I try to make things better for myself and my family, something else always comes along and makes everything worse? I was always striving, not even for perfection, but to make things better.

    I really wanted a different way, to live a life without the stress, struggle, fear, and health issues.

    Fortunately, a friend introduced me to the benefits of guided meditation and how to shift your mindset, and once I understood how powerful these practices could be in helping me to improve my quality of life, I didn’t look back.

    Even though it was a struggle for a while, as I made the changes I needed to make—which included restructuring my business, moving three times in twelve months, managing my chronic health issues, and working through the trauma—I have now found a place where I can notice and find joy in the small things, and I have hope for the future.

    I learned that, if we can keep a positive outlook and focus on ourselves and how we respond in any situation, we can change how we feel about everything. But how can we do this when we are feeling stuck?

    The first thing to realize is that you can’t change others. You can only change yourself and the way that you respond or react.

    You can only alter the choices you make in your life and how you can make the world a better place. And the good news is you don’t need to do anything big to do that.

    What if you can find small ways to improve:

    • Your relationships with family and friends. (For example, by being more present and listening to their interests and needs.)
    • Your kindness and care in relating to people you meet. (For example, by questioning your judgements rather than reacting immediately.)
    • The way you feel about yourself. (For example, by expressing gratitude for everything you’re doing right.)

    What if you can change the way that you look after your environment in your home and community?

    What if doing these things has a flow-on effect to everyone else you meet?

    What if you say or do something, even a seemingly small thing, that makes others feel more love and joy?

    What if they then go on to change something about themselves that gives them more joy and happiness in their lives?

    What if each person pays it forward a little more?

    We are so much more powerful than we think. Just by changing our perceptions and our actions we have an exponential effect on the people around us.

    Did you know that your thoughts and memories are just perceptions of your reality, based on your own life experiences, with some unconscious conditioning thrown in? Every single person in this world experiences life in a different way based on their past, as well as patterns of behavior that developed from a need to feel loved, nurtured, or a sense of belonging as a young child.

    Studies have even shown that people who witness an event, e.g., a crime, will always have a different interpretation of what happened compared with anyone else, because we all have our own biases. Often, our memories, when compared with actual video footage of the crime, will be completely inaccurate.

    How does this relate to you and lowering your stress and anxiety?

    It means that in any given moment you can choose how to perceive the events going in your life, in the community, and world around you.

    You can choose to wallow in fear and frustration about things that are outside of your control, or you can choose to empower yourself by focusing on the good and all the things within your control. Like the things that make you feel better. Because when you feel better, you do better, for everyone and everything around you.

    Ask yourself, what do I need to do to feel more joy and happiness and hope?

    Be consciously aware of your thoughts and notice what comes to you. What do you want to keep and what does not serve your own happiness and joy?

    For me, I decided to stop spending as much time looking at news feeds and social media. Most of it is not positive or just made me feel like I was inadequate, so I cut it right back.

    I actively sought to change conversations with family and friends that were fear-driven, by changing the subject. Unless the person really wanted help or advice that was going to support them in moving forward.

    I also made the decision to stop working so hard and enjoy whatever time I have left on this earth. I decided to focus on things that bring me health and happiness.

    Here are some of the things I like to do to feel happier, healthier, and more hopeful. Feel free to take what works for you and leave the rest. If none of these resonate, then take some time to sit and ask yourself, what can you do differently? What makes you feel good?

    • Take a bath.
    • Call a friend.
    • Play a musical instrument or create some art.
    • Listen to music.
    • Find a space on your own, even for just a few minutes, and use some gentle background music to soothe your mind and help you gather your thoughts. Doing this can often help us release the tension, even just a little, and give us some space to work out what is important to us.
    • Spend some time creating a dream board, a bucket list, or even a list of things you’d love to have or do in your life. Even though it might seem like some of those things are impossible to achieve, writing down our dreams and desires can lift our mood and gives us hope and something to look forward to.
    • Plan a treat for yourself or your family—go out for ice cream and sit by a river, lake, or beach; find a recipe that you and your family would love and work together to make it; or take a bike ride.
    • Find a spot to sit outside and observe nature and the world around you. Notice something you’ve never looked at properly before. Observe and appreciate its beauty. Look at it like a child might, with wonder and curiosity.
    • Don’t be afraid to ask someone to support you or to help out, whether it’s for a chat or some physical assistance. Most often, people are more than willing and enjoy helping. You just need to ask.

    Choose just one thing that you can do differently to improve your mood and outlook and commit to making it happen. Trust the ripple effect will happen and be proud that you are making a difference for yourself and others.

  • How to Let Go of Your Need to Be Informed at all Times

    How to Let Go of Your Need to Be Informed at all Times

    “Don’t mistake being informed by trusting what you hear or read in the news. The most trusted information is what you feel in your gut.” ~Charles F Glassman

    I was in my kitchen enjoying breakfast when a report about a murder was mentioned as one of the headlines on the radio news.

    One of my boys started to ask me questions, none of which I could answer. They were questions about a detail of the murder, which I didn’t know, and also about bigger life issues, which at 7 a.m., I was struggling to get my head around.

    I chose to turn the radio off, told the boys that we would chat about it later, and then removed the radio from the kitchen. This was in 2019, and I haven’t missed the radio since.

    I’ve always had a radio in my kitchen and always listened to a talk-based radio station, so it felt a bit awkward for the first week or so, but over time, we began chatting more as a family in the mornings because we didn’t all have one ear tuned into the news.

    A mentor and friend of mine told me a while ago she no longer watches the news. This gave me the permission I felt I needed to embrace this no-news new way of living. I never questioned her decision or asked for more details about the choice she had made. I knew something in me had flipped; I was no longer going to consume the news. This was going to mean radio, television, paper, and social media for me.

    I had to form a few new habits around my news consumption. The next time I was driving my car I took a selection of my old CDs and a charger cable to plug my phone in so I could listen to audiobooks or podcasts. I always used to watch the 10:00 p.m. news headlines, but I decided to leave the sofa at 9:59 and hop straight up to bed at that time. I also stopped buying my weekend newspapers and turned off all news notifications on my phone.

    My husband will occasionally say, “Oh, did you hear such and such on the news?” And I reply, “Nope, remember, I don’t get the news anymore” and then we start talking about something else.

    I understand that the news highlights human interest stories, and part of the need to feel connected to each other might be fulfilled by taking in news stories, but I had to turn away when it all got too much.

    When COVID hit, I questioned my decision. Was I being willfully ignorant? Well, no, actually. I don’t think so.

    I was working in local government at the time, and all my work was face to face with very vulnerable people. My line manager was masterful at protecting his staff team and giving us all the information we needed to do our jobs as safely as possible. There was no way the media, local or national, could have helped me out on that one. I was aware of what was going on because, of course, people told me. Sometimes I was willing to listen to a bit of detail, but mostly not.

    I don’t feel like I’m missing out by not keeping up with the news. I’m acutely aware of what I can control in my life. And I know most of what I would see, hear, or read on the news wouldn’t directly affect me. I came to the conclusion that the news always made me feel worse than before I’d heard or seen it.

    I also recognized that I was not taking the time to see a variety of news sources or get differing viewpoints, so what I was getting was incredibly biased. It seemed to be debt, disaster, or some kind of controversy on repeat. I was not being uplifted in any way shape or form.

    I realized that my life is going to be short enough. I sometimes don’t have enough time for the stuff I really want. So why was I wasting a precious second on something I had no control or influence over?

    I spend a morning a week volunteering with refugees and asylum seekers who tell me their stories. I’d far rather hear first-hand realities from people who are in the same room as me.

    Since turning off all the news channels in my house I have been able to tune in to my intuition and gut feelings more. The less I have consumed other people’s opinions on world events, the more I can hear the whispers of my soul.

    If I need to know something, of course, I can go and look it up. My own research is tailored to what I want or need. I don’t feel like I’m missing out in any way. I feel like everything in my life is slightly better without consuming the news in the way that I used to. I save some money and time and experience far less anxiety. All good things in my opinion.

    I don’t know if I’ll ever go back to watching, listening to, or reading the news in the future. I haven’t missed it in three years (apparently a lot has happened), and I’m doing just fine without it.

    If you’re also considering giving up the news, it might help to start by asking yourself why you’ve felt the need to be informed at all times. Does it stem from fear and the desire to feel safe or in control? Or is it simply that you don’t want to be ignorant about something everyone else might know about and discuss? Then ask yourself what you’re really gaining and what you’re losing—time, energy, or peace, for example.

    Once you understand why you’re constantly tuning in it will be a lot easier to tune out.

    If the idea of eliminating all news feels too much at the moment, perhaps you could try reducing it in one area of your life. Go back to reading a novel instead of a paper on a Sunday. Watch the headlines at 6 p.m. but not the whole program. Listen to a podcast on a subject you feel passionate about and not on a topic you think you should know about.

    We’re bombarded with information these days, but we get to decide what we take in based on what feels best for us.

  • A Gentle Reminder to Anyone Who’s Struggling This Holiday Season

    A Gentle Reminder to Anyone Who’s Struggling This Holiday Season

    “It’s okay to want to be alone. It’s okay to take time for yourself.” ~Kate Allan

    It’s the holiday season, the most wonderful time of the year, they say, but it’s not for all of us. For those of us coping with the loss of a loved one, family estrangement, loneliness, financial difficulties, or health struggles, the holidays can be one of the hardest times of the year.

    For some of us the holidays can feel as if we have been cast out in the cold. As if we are forced to look through a window of a happy, loving family.

    Many of us are filled with feelings of longing for things that can never be, such as more time with a loved one we have lost or a supportive family. We find ourselves swept into memories of holidays past or lost in fantasies about what the holidays would be like if we had a different life.

    We find ourselves feeling pressured to hide our problems, bake a dozen cookies, put on a happy smile and an ugly Christmas sweater, and attend that office holiday party. There, we smile and engage in exhausting small talk, and do our best to avoid the subject of what we are doing for the holidays.

    These events can leave us feeling totally depleted. We buy obligatory gifts for our friends or coworkers, and we spend hours trying to figure out what they might like. After the gift is purchased, we second guess ourselves and worry that we missed the mark.

    Some of us might host parties and obsess over making our tree look absolutely perfect in a desperate effort to please others and give people the impression that everything is fine.

    Society has filled our heads with unrealistic notions about perfect gifts, immaculate homes decorated with lavish matching decorations, endless resources to spend, and happy times spent with family. Some of us find ourselves exhausted and stressed trying to live up to social pressures or expectations of others.

    Over the years, as I have struggled with various losses in my life or felt cast aside by family members, I have learned that the most important thing we can do over the holidays is take care of ourselves.

    As an altruistic person who goes out of the way to please everyone, taking care of myself does not come easily to me. In the past I felt guilty for putting my own needs first, but over the years I’ve learned that our own needs are just as important as everyone else’s. If we sacrifice ourselves to please others, it can not only be harmful to ourselves but those around us as well.

    If you are struggling this holiday season, take time to reflect on how you would like to spend the holidays. Remember, you don’t have to buy the perfect gift for everyone, put up a tree, decorate the entire house, spend hours baking cookies, or even attend that family gathering.

    If you are worried that a friend will be disappointed that you are not attending an event, you can suggest that you meet up for coffee when you’re feeling up to it.

    In the past I worried that a friend would judge me for not attending a holiday event. However, over the years I have learned that true friends are empathetic and do not judge us for needing to take time for ourselves.

    The most important thing you can do if you are struggling during the holiday season is pay attention to your own needs and do what you feel is best for you.

    If you feel like curling up on the couch with Netflix or a good book and a pet instead of going to a party or a family gathering, give yourself permission. It can sometimes be better for our health and well-being to decline an invitation and rest.

    If you are someone who is used to keeping busy, the holidays can become more difficult because our workplaces are often closed or slower than other times of the year.

    In order to cope, I create a to-do list filled with new recipes I want to cook or bake, household cleaning that would be helpful to do, movies/shows I want to watch, places I want to go to see Christmas lights, and other things I have wanted to do. I also buy myself something that I have always wanted but don’t necessarily need as a form of self-love and self-affirmation.

    I also engage in volunteer work because when I am helping others I feel less alone and have less time to ruminate about the past or events that are outside of my control.

    I have discarded holiday traditions that did not bring me joy. I don’t go to church or make desserts with dried fruit or decorate my tree with handmade ornaments that are unsafe for my pets. I try not to buy material gifts for all of my friends. Instead, I treat friends to events such as concerts, art gallery exhibits, or museum shows we can enjoy together.

    I have held onto a few traditions that have made me happy. A childhood friend used to buy me a hallmark ornament as a gift, and now I buy one for myself. I donate to a charity, and I buy a gift for a for a child in need.

    I have also started to create my own traditions such as making my favorite cake and taking a break from digital communication. Each day I take time to feel grateful for the things that I have and the people and pets that help to make my life magical.

    I don’t force myself to do anything I am not feeling up for, and I do not spend time with people I do not feel comfortable being around. Once I started doing this, the holidays stopped being draining, exhausting, and socially challenging and started to become relaxing and peaceful.

    When I find myself feeling down, I remind myself that all situations are temporary, and the future could look very different. There may be other holiday seasons when I feel upbeat, excited, and eager to spend time with people who love me. But for now, I need to love myself, and that means doing what’s best for me.

    The best thing that any of us can do this holiday season is be kind to ourselves and take care of ourselves like we would our closest friend. This is the best holiday gift we can give ourselves.

  • How I Got Sober and What I Now Know About the Impacts of Alcohol

    How I Got Sober and What I Now Know About the Impacts of Alcohol

    “Sometimes deciding who you are is deciding who you’ll never be again.” ~Anonymous

    May 13th, 2011. I finally surrendered to the fact that I had a drinking problem and desperately needed help. The comments from acquaintances, the concern from friends, the complaints from my flatmates, the intensity of my depression, the conversations with my therapist—they all culminated in the decision that I had to break the chains from my liquid abuser.

    It was one of the hardest decisions of my life, one that entailed waving goodbye to the life that I had led before and diving into a new one where I didn’t have any points of reference and safety handles to grasp.

    At that time, the only option I thought was available to me was AA, so I emailed their helpline on that Friday at 2:43 p.m. Only an hour later I received a response from someone who seemed to care and understood my turmoil and despair, who took the time to share some of her own story, which I could relate to.

    I began going to meetings right away, and my friend Federica held my hand for the first two. I felt blessed to have her calming and loving presence next to me while I was full of fear and confusion. I will forever be grateful to her.

    Stopping

    I stopped drinking as soon as I joined AA. I started going to three meetings a week. I was aware that my levels of drinking were quite below the average threshold of most of the fellowship members, but I was advised to look at the similarities, not the differences, so I did.

    My quiver was now equipped with shimmering new arrows: I had the strength of my resolution, my meetings to go to, the opportunity to mix and match them when I wanted to, a whole community of people I could connect with, and, very quickly, a steady group of friends to go out with after our regular meetings and on weekends.

    I had found almost everything I was lacking and more in the space of a few weeks. I know that finding those people was what made it so easy for me to stay sober, because we enjoyed each other’s company and everything we did was not alcohol-related; also, I was never physically dependent. I was an “emotionally dependent” drinker.

    What I didn’t know then was that this bubble I had created was a very fragile one because it lacked my personal foundations of sobriety.

    Nine months after I quit drinking, on a dating website, I met the man that would become my beloved life companion and husband. I made space for him in my bubble, and he opened up to me the portal to his life.

    I became part of an outside world that I had not interacted with and had unintentionally kept at distance since I had quit drinking. I started to feel like the odd one out, and I began to resent everyone else who “could” drink.

    I could recognize other people who were problem drinkers but had not made the same decision as me, and I felt it was unfair that they got away with it, that they were the ones considered normal, and that I was the one with the problem.

    I was a ball of anger that was seeping out toward everyone, but I didn’t know how to process it. I had also started a job that was very demanding, and most of the time I was out of my depth.

    Gradually, I convinced myself that I could revisit that decision I made on that day in May and that I was ready to welcome alcohol back into my life, but in smaller and more reasonable doses.

    The day I decided to drink again was so uneventful that I don’t even remember it. I know it was almost two years after I had quit and that I had a small glass of wine. I didn’t even enjoy the feeling of being tipsy, and I took that as an assurance that alcohol would have never turned into my nemesis, but a presence that I could keep at bay and out of my life when I wanted to. I was proved wrong. Again.

    Breaking

    After approximately six months, those synaptic pathways had been retriggered. I was self-medicating my stress and depression caused by a job that I could not stomach, and the familiar shortcut was in a liquor store.

    What I later learned is that I didn’t start drinking again because I had a disease. I started for the same reason that I was able to ride a bike years after I last rode one.

    On one hand, I had learned through repetition that the quickest way to find relief from my problems was to drink alcohol, and that the pleasure I gained from it activated the reward circuit in my brain; this motivated me to repeat that behavior over and over again by reactivating the neuropathways that had already been established many years before.

    On the other hand, I had not built new, healthier ways to address those problems, I had not created new habits, and that’s why I was back standing in the alcohol aisle.

    I don’t know how I managed to drink heavily, still holding down that job successfully and completing a one-year life coaching training program. But I did both, and when I moved from London to a smaller town on the coast, I solemnly promised myself and my husband that my drinking would change.

    I had left the job I hated so much, and I was studying, searching for employment, and living in a town that I loved. I had no more excuses this time. But, instead of decreasing, my drinking increased because I didn’t have the constraints and responsibility of a job, and that freed up more time.

    My Way Out

    This time around, though, I knew I didn’t want to resort to AA because I felt that it wasn’t the right solution for me. I saw AA as a Band-Aid to stem the bleeding of my alcohol use, and if it were torn off, the wound would start bleeding again.

    AA also did not delve into the reasons I was making these poor decisions, nor did it prepare the future me for an alcohol-free life. I also was not comfortable with the idea of being in recovery and going to meetings forever; I wanted to be free.

    I didn’t know what my solution was going to look like, but I was open to trying other ways. I made a decision to stop and contacted a local organization. I got myself an appointment, had a brief assessment, and was invited to attend groups and activities there.

    I attended a women’s group a handful of times, but I felt in my bones that it wasn’t an environment where my sobriety would have thrived. But by contacting them, I had made the official step to accept and see my problem in full scale before my eyes, and, in my mind, I could not backtrack after that.

    The second step was to educate myself on what alcohol really was, and I dove into anything I could find—books, podcasts, courses, videos, and online communities—like a fish to water.

    I learned the impact alcohol has on our physical and mental health; the extent to which it interferes with the neurotransmitters in our brain and affects our central nervous system; how, as a consequence, it causes anxiety and depression; how it kills our confidence bit by bit under the mask of giving us “courage.”

    I understood that it’s a solution to a problem, and that the problem can be different for any one of us. And that some people decide to suppress their problem with alcohol, others with food, shopping, or other substances.

    I learned that alcohol is a toxin, a carcinogenic psychoactive drug, and a highly addictive substance, and that the reason we get emotionally addicted to it is because it taps on the reward system in the brain.

    I came to understand that the effect it had on me was the result of a chemical reaction, not a disease, and it is explained by science, and that it developed into a problem because it was the easiest shortcut I had to solve my issue.

    The third step was attending to my emotional recovery and looking at the problems that alcohol had solved for me. This, for me, was the key where freedom from alcohol truly lay.

    Setting my sobriety against something that was outside of me and being dependent on a structure to maintain it was one of the things that pushed me away from AA. So, for me, there was only one thing to do. Go back to the source, me, and understand where the pull of alcohol came from.

    A few months before I stopped drinking, as part of my endeavor to find a career that had purpose and meaning for me, I had completed the EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) certification. As part of my training, I had to carry out practice sessions with other certified colleagues.

    I met a lady who introduced me to the concept of being a “highly sensitive person” and realized that I was one too. I finally found the validation of my being “too emotional,” “too intense,” and “too sensitive,” epithets that had been used to describe me and that made me feel wrong.

    In my sessions with her, she helped me to uncover layer after layer of emotions, thoughts, and memories that were connected to my drinking and to the pain that I was trying to erase with it.

    We started with the most superficial ones, then reached the deeper and most ancient, which is the safest and recommended protocol to use EFT.

    The work I did by myself, with her, and with other colleagues along the way helped me to relieve my cravings when I had them and release the triggers that used to make me run to the liquor store like a brainless bullet. It also helped me recognize when I’d started to believe that alcohol turned me into the confident and self-assured person I struggled and strived to be.

    I experienced numerous shifts along the way. One of them is that I no longer resent people who drink. I can still recognize when someone has an unhealthy relationship with alcohol, but instead of feeling like they got away with it, my perception has changed. I feel like I am the lucky one who got away because alcohol has no place in my life, and there is not one tiny cell of me that would ever want to drink again.

    I know that there is nothing positive that alcohol can add to my life and that all I need is within me.

    I would like to show this to people who struggle with alcohol and tell them how wonderful, rich, rewarding, fun, and relaxing life is without it. And that their body has the capability to do all of the above without it, and that the fun, the excitement, or the relaxation they find in it is short-lived, but the consequences are not.

    But I know that we all have our own journeys, and it’s not my place to interfere with theirs.

    I already told the most important person I needed to tell, and that is my younger self.

    When I went to find her in my memories, I told her that she didn’t need alcohol to be the amazing and lovely girl that she was. I told her that I loved her with all my heart, and that she had all the resources she needed within her to find her way back to herself.

    She cried, then she smiled and thanked me for reminding her and for believing in her.

  • Stay in the Right Lane: Let Yourself Slow Down and Enjoy Life

    Stay in the Right Lane: Let Yourself Slow Down and Enjoy Life

    “I don’t want to get to the end of my life and find that I lived just the length of it. I want to have lived the width of it as well.” ~Diane Ackerman

    Wow! My last weeks of my career. Though many days and weeks over the last thirty-four years have seemed to last forever, it truly is astonishing how fast time goes. And don’t we often try to make it go even faster?

    Our jobs are stressful. We are often under tight time constraints and deadlines. We have clients and associates who want and need things yesterday.

    We work in jobs we have very little control over. Add that to our daily responsibilities as parents, spouses, partners, friends, children to aging parents and—not to be forgotten—ourselves. It’s a lot.

    Maybe you are like me. When I was younger, I too often:

    • wanted to fast-forward to a new day, a new week, or a new season of life
    • wished time away
    • focused on that vacation that was months away
    • couldn’t wait until my kids were older
    • had my eye on that next job
    • sought to get through tough circumstances I was facing, or
    • desired to be where someone else was in life

    What did it cost me? Memories and opportunities. I don’t remember many details of when my kids were growing up because I was always thinking ahead. I was not in the moment.

    I missed opportunities to learn and grow because I was always focused on that next thing instead of learning what could help me in that next thing.

    I missed all the beauty this earth has to offer because I was driving too fast.

    It cost me time. I wished away something I can never get back. It cost me the fun of simply living life, my life.

    It has taken me sixty-five years on earth to figure out how to make every moment count. And, if I’m honest, it’s something I must work at every day.

    “Don’t focus on making each moment perfect, focus on the perfection each moment provides, be it a good one, or not so good one.” ~Jenna Kutcher

    Notice that I didn’t say “make every moment happy, productive, or memorable.” Just make it count. Be in it. Live it.

    There are many moments that aren’t happy. In fact, they can be downright sorrowful or exhausting. But, at the same time, they help shape you and enable you to grow.

    I missed many good moments in my life because I was too focused on making the ending happy or perfect to enjoy what was happening right before my eyes.

    A few years ago, my son and I met up with a good friend of mine. We started talking about our kids and what fun it was to go to all of their events when they were younger. I was pounding my chest by bragging about being at all of their events.

    My son, to his credit, challenged me. He said I was there physically, but I wasn’t really there. He told my friend I was always on my phone, or otherwise preoccupied. He was right. I was there but I can’t tell you about the goals they scored, the amazing moves they made, or the songs they sang. It was like a dagger went through my heart. But it was true.

    My dear friend Doug told me a great way he is trying to live right now. He said, “stay in the right lane.” I love that. We often want to get somewhere fast, so we pull into the left lane and zoom past everything to get to the destination. 

    I did that most of my life, in all areas of my life. As I start to live in the right lane, I am having an easier time being more in the moment. I am being intentional.

    I start my day with a routine of praying, journaling, exercising, and setting my focus to not be on one or two things, but to be awed by the wonder of what I might encounter. I intentionally set aside days where I do not have a set schedule.

    As I am more in the moment, I am experiencing all sorts of beauty, joy, amazement, clarity, purposefulness, happiness, and opportunity.

    When you look at my photo library, you will see mostly pictures of bugs, birds, flowers, and trees from my walks. My mind has space to be creative and I am finding clarity on the things I want to do in this season of life, for me. My relationships are flourishing because I am actually there, truly experiencing another person.

    Being present has also allowed me to see myself for more of who I am. I have often said I never felt I was good enough. I felt I had to do more in order to be enough. Now that I have more clarity on who I am, I want to do more, because I am enough. I realize that no matter what I do from here on out, I am good enough. Because of who I am, not what I do.

    Many have asked what I will do in retirement. Like, retirement is the end, so how will you live to the end? I am looking at it more as a transition into the next leg of my journey.

    I am going to continue to live in the right lane, enjoy every moment, create and experience new moments, and focus on the journey itself, not the destination. I plan to live as Laurie Santos puts it, “be happy in my life, and with my life.”

    “The most dangerous risk of all…is the risk of spending your life not doing what you want, on the bet you can buy yourself the freedom to do it later.” ~Randy Komisar

    So how do you do that? It isn’t always easy.

    Have good self-awareness (know yourself and trust yourself). Be intentional. Make time for the people and things that matter. Make the time to think about what you really want in life.

    And slow yourself down.

  • The 5 Happiness Zappers and What Helps Me Cope with Them

    The 5 Happiness Zappers and What Helps Me Cope with Them

    “Emotion in itself is not unhappiness. Only emotion plus an unhappy story is unhappiness.” ~Eckhart Tolle

    When my mother told me, “Honey, you don’t understand; you can’t,” initially I felt like she was being condescending.

    It was Mother’s Day and, unbeknownst to me, the last time I’d see her before her final hospital visit.

    We’d spent that Saturday updating her computer, watching waves at the beach, and picking up seashells, then eating dinner at a popular local restaurant frequented by travelers, including famous musicians on tour buses because of its location off of the interstate.

    By early evening, we were lying on her bed talking mostly about nothing important. However, when she mentioned that she was organizing all her pictures in zip lock bags for her two sisters, my brother, and me, it sounded strange yet significant.

    “Why?” I asked.

    “I’m not going to live forever,” she said.

    “But you’re doing fine right now,” I responded referring to her health at the moment. Her health challenges in the past few years had made it necessary for her to move to live closer to her older sister.

    The conversation segued to how much she missed her mother, my nanny, who’d passed away twenty-two years earlier. The emotional angst in her voice caught me off guard. I was close to my nanny and missed her too but could tell that my mom missed her at a deeper emotional level than I understood.

    I asked questions, trying to understand exactly what she missed. Did she miss talking to her? Her cooking? Her laugh? But she didn’t or couldn’t answer. Instead, she looked into my eyes with one of those motherly looks that said, “enough of the questions.” Then she said, “Honey, you don’t understand. You can’t.”

    I knew it was time to change the subject, so we watched TV and continued chatting about lighthearted nothings before going to sleep.

    Although the conversation felt unsettling, I did what most of us do when something rattles our gut—I ignored it.

    Three months later, I received a call from my aunt telling me that my brother and I needed to get there quickly because my mom was in the hospital. After two surgeries and almost three weeks in ICU on a ventilator, she passed.

    That’s when the journey started and I’d finally be able to understand the meaning of my mother’s haunting words.

    It’s been almost eighteen years since she passed. Even now, there are moments when grief shows up and her loss feels as painful as the day she left. When that happens, I replay the conversation we had on Mother’s Day in my head and realize how right she was. Then I cry more because I want to tell her how right she was but can’t.

    There are some things you can’t really understand until you experience them. You can imagine how you’d feel in a situation, how you’d react to it. That’s empathy. Or you can just know the experience would feel awful. That’s sympathy. However, you can’t really understand until you experience it.

    As the founder of the Society of Happy People, I’ve spent a lot of time understanding happiness. I even identified thirty-one types of happiness because I wanted people to recognize all of the happiness that they might not notice or take for granted.

    However, after losing my mom, I also realized what is really obvious yet not always acknowledged—all unhappiness isn’t the same. There’s a huge difference in grieving a loss and being stressed because you’re late for a lunch date due to traffic annoyances.

    Although both cause you to feel bad or unhappy in the moment, their lingering effects are vastly different. All experiences that make us feel unhappy are not equal. Yet we’ve been taught to think if we aren’t happy, we’re simply unhappy. It’s an oversimplification of our emotional experiences.

    I started thinking of experiences that took me away from feeling good as Happiness Zappers.

    Then I started categorizing them: unhappiness, stress, fear, chaos, and annoyances.

    Then, depending on the type of Happiness Zapper, I’d decide how to manage it. Some zappers simply didn’t have the same effects as others. However, in all cases if I didn’t acknowledge the zapper, it would manage me instead of me managing it.

    Each day, every single human being on the planet will experience different Happiness Zappers. How we choose to manage them significantly impacts how long they impact us and our lack of happiness.

    The five types of Happiness Zappers are:

    1. Unhappiness

    Unhappiness is most often connected to loss when we must create a new normal over time.

    Obviously, the death of someone or a pet we love is the ultimate loss.

    Yet other losses redefine our lives, too: unwanted career changes, health challenges, friend or family estrangements, and other normal, expected, or even unexpected life changes such as aging, empty-nesting, caretaking, or retiring.

    Unhappiness results from experiences that we rarely have control over and probably didn’t want to happen yet have to learn to live with. It takes time to adjust to life with the missing piece or changes we have to make due to circumstances beyond our control. And there may always be moments even after we think we’ve adjusted or healed from a loss when the void is triggered, and it can shoot a pang in our heart that makes us feel sad again.

    While the ongoing pangs of pain from loss usually reduce over time, the scars they leave can flare up without notice and we feel the sad, hurt, and loss all over again.

    2. Stress

    Stress is when we feel pressure or tension from things that require a response from us that can impact us mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually.

    Most of us feel stressed more than once most days. Although everyone has different stressors, some common ones include having too many tasks, facing too much uncertainty, making decisions, coping with difficult situations, or dealing with difficult people/events.

    Whatever the source of our stress, it’s important that we learn to manage it because it adversely impacts our overall health when we don’t. Of course, managing stress is different for everyone and every situation. Sometimes, a situation needs to change. Other times, it’s about utilizing tools that soothe our hearts, minds, and souls, such as meditation, exercise, aromatherapy, a thinking walk, a hot bath, or any fun activity.

    The situations that create stress are fluid—which means once one is gone, another one shows up. That’s why it’s important to understand your stress triggers and the tools that help you manage your stressors.

    3. Fear

    Fear creates a physiological change that influences our behavior when we are threatened by a dangerous situation or we believe something may threaten our physical or emotional safety in the future.

    While some fears are real—your home is in the path of a hurricane landing, or you’re being abused, for example—the majority of our fears pertain to “what could happen,” and they’re usually worst-case instead of best-case scenarios.

    When we don’t manage the fears in our mind, they often lead to regret. They stop us from trying new things, meeting new people, and doing things we’ve dreamed about. As Henry Wadsworth Longfellow said, “A man’s life is the history of his fears.”

    Sometimes, simply doing something that triggers a fear—like eating at a restaurant alone, applying for a job, or going to a party where you don’t know many people—regardless of the outcome, is our success. And successful is one of the Society of Happy People’s thirty-one types of happiness.

    4. Chaos

    Chaos happens when things are in disarray, unorganized, and confusing.

    Chaos could be anything from your alarm going off late, an unexpected guest showing up, or your boss changing your day’s to-do list, to dealing with an act of mother nature in your neighborhood.

    It’s in those moments when you really aren’t in control that you simply have to move into a triage mode of tasks and priorities based on the current situation.

    The best thing to remember when in the middle of a chaotic situation is that the actual chaotic moments are usually temporary. The chaos will subside. There may be lingering stressors after the actual chaos, but the heightened emotionally charged moments end.

    5. Annoyances

    Annoyances are when someone or something irritates or bothers us to the point that our mood is adversely affected.

    What annoys you one day may not annoy you another day. Annoyances are subjective to what’s going on around you at any given moment.

    However, they have a common theme—you probably won’t remember them a year from now. So you need to ask yourself, “Is this really worth taking away from my happiness now?”

    —

    My mom’s death taught me many things. One of the most important lessons was that unhappiness isn’t everything that makes you feel bad. There are varying degrees of feeling bad. Real unhappiness is usually centered around loss and grieving, and not only deaths.

    Acknowledging loss and grief empowers us to manage it. It gives us permission to feel our myriad of feelings when our grief is triggered. It gives us permission to cry, to be angry, to feel numb, to mourn. Although unhappiness feels lonely, in most cases there are others who’ve been in similar places who can help us navigate our experience if we reach out.

    Our other happiness zapping experiences—stress, fear, chaos, and annoyances—rarely have lingering pains. In most cases we get to manage these Happiness Zappers and to a degree determine how long we will allow them to zap our happiness.

    Unhappiness comes from experiences that most likely changed us and our lives in a way we didn’t want changed. Then it becomes part of us and will revisit our heart from time to time. The more we understand what unhappiness actually is and how it works in our lives, the better we can manage it.

  • How I Stopped Carrying the Weight of the World and Started Enjoying Life

    How I Stopped Carrying the Weight of the World and Started Enjoying Life

    “These mountains that you are carrying, you were only supposed to climb.” ~Najwa Zebian

    During a personal development course, one of my first assignments was to reach out to three friends and ask them to list my top three qualities. It was to help me see myself the way others saw me.

    At the time, my confidence was low and I couldn’t truly see myself. I didn’t remember who I was or what I wanted. The assignment was a way to rebuild my self-esteem and see myself from a broader perspective.

    As I vulnerably asked and then received the responses, I immediately felt disappointed. All three lists shared commonalties, specifically around responsibility. The problem was, I didn’t see responsibility as a positive trait. In fact, I didn’t want to be responsible; I wanted to be light, fun, and joyful.

    Though I understood that my loved ones shared this trait in a positive light—as in I was trustworthy and caring—intuitively, I knew responsibility was my armor. I used it to protect and control while, deep down, I wanted to be free and true to myself.

    I didn’t trust life. I found myself unable to let go out of fear of what may or may not happen to myself and others. I let my imagination run loose in dark places and believed if I thought my way out of every bad scenario or was on guard, I could somehow be prepared to meet the challenges that arose.

    I thought that if I oversaw everything, it would get taken care of correctly and then I’d be safe from the pain of life. The pain in life was not only my own, but my family’s, the local community’s, and the world’s. I wanted to plan and plot a way to fix everything so that everything would be perfect.

    I saw myself as a doer—a person that takes actions and makes stuff happen. I relied heavily on pushing myself and coming up with solutions and, at times, took pride in my ability to work hard, multi-task, and be clever. With time, however, I felt resentful and exhausted.

    Over the years it became too heavy a burden. My shoulders could no longer carry the weight of the world, and I was incapable of juggling so many balls. I had to let go.

    There were so many things that were out of my control, including situations that had nothing to do with me, and yet there were so many people I loved and so many dangerous possibilities.

    Living in a state of constant responsibility meant I had to be alert; I had to be on guard. I was never present and thus unable to have fun. I didn’t understand how to enjoy life while being responsible. I saw these as competing desires and ended up avoiding joy totally.

    I believed I could save joy for a vacation or that wedding coming up next month. I always postponed joy until later so that I could resume being responsible.

    However, being a doer and taking responsibility for things that were not in my direct control had consequences. I was unhappy and drained, constantly wondering why I couldn’t just relax and enjoy life.

    Even when I went away on a vacation, I was unable to calm my mind and have fun. I told myself once x,y,z was taken care of, then I’d feel calm, but then something new would come up and I’d be thinking about that instead of enjoying my trip.

    This left me with a powerful realization: I felt safer feeling anxious and tense than I did feeling happy.

    In some twisted way, it served me. At the time, being happy was too vulnerable, while being on guard for the next catastrophe felt safer. This was not how I wanted to continue living life.

    I wanted to remove the armor. I wanted to trust and enjoy life, and I wanted to believe that whether or not I was on top of everything, things would work out.

    I knew that I could be responsible without carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders. That I could be dependable and caring without being stressed or serious. Those were expectations I had falsely placed on myself, and it was up to me to remove them.

    Once I realized that solving the world’s problems was harming my health and that I was choosing fear over joy out of a false sense of security, I decided to give myself permission to feel the discomfort and vulnerability of happiness. In doing so I found the courage to let go, trust, play, and love life.

    I began setting boundaries with myself. The person that had placed the badge of responsibility on my shoulders was me, and I had chosen to do it out of fear, not love. I had to let go of knowing everything that was going on in other people’s lives and the world and take space from social media, friends, and family to make space for me.

    I began to cultivate joy by practicing presence daily and taking the time to do things I enjoyed doing.

    I took yoga classes, watched comedy shows, went to the beach, and continued personal development courses.

    I learned that although I was great at multi-tasking and pushing through, it wasn’t what I wanted. I wanted to courageously follow my dreams and enjoy my precious life.

    That meant that I had to feel the uncertainty, sadness, and danger of life’s circumstances without jumping in to fix anything. I had to take a step back and bring awareness to my thoughts so I wouldn’t unconsciously join the merry-go-round of solving problems.

    I was a beginner at all these things, but the more I practiced, the more joy I experienced, and this spread onto others. Surprisingly, friends would tell me how I inspired and helped them—not by solving their problems but by being bold enough to enjoy my life.

    If you want to enjoy your life but stress yourself out trying to save everyone from pain, begin to set boundaries with yourself. Stay in your lane and focus on the areas you have direct control over—your attitude, your daily activities, and your perspectives.

    Try slowing down, investing time and energy into activities that light you up. You can’t protect anyone from what’s coming in the future, but you can enjoy your present by letting go and opening up to joy.