Tag: wisdom
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When You Don’t Like Being Nice: What to Do Instead
“Don’t trade your authenticity for approval.” ~Unknown
As a nice person, I am often conflicted because sometimes I don’t enjoy being nice. Sometimes I act nice out of moral obligation or because I’m trying to be consistent with my perceived identity.
Do you view yourself as “nice”? Do others describe you as “nice”? Do you always enjoy being “nice”? If you are unsure how you are perceived by others, ask friends and family to describe you.
I’ve been told how nice I am all my life, by family, friends, coworkers, and even bosses. It was a huge part of my personal identity. When you have a perceived identity of who you are, you’ll unconsciously adjust your behaviors to reflect that identity. For me, that meant being nice and acting like a nice person, even if it wasn’t what I wanted.
Here are some questions to help you identify if you have any conflicts with being nice:
* Do you do nice things when you really don’t want to?
* Do others take advantage of your niceness?
* Have you experienced social pressure to be nice, especially as a woman?
* Are you a pushover? Are you a people-pleaser?
* Do you ever get upset, frustrated, or resentful when you are nice?
* Do you sometimes feel like your niceness is not really you?
* Is being nice at the top of your self-identity list?
* Do you ever experience conflict between your nice identity and your other identities such as achiever, assertive, or leader?
* Do you sometimes not feel proud of being nice?
If your answered yes to any of these questions, then continue reading.
What does “being nice” mean to you?
One day someone asked me this question. It was very relevant to me since I have tried to act nice for most of my life despite experiencing several of the conflicts listed above.
I developed three questions to help me define “being nice” in my own terms:
- Who is your “nice” role model, and do you want to be like them?
- What other words describe being nice to you?
- Should you act or be nice?
First question: Who is your “nice” role model, and do you want to be like them?
When I picture the extreme “nice,” I see Mother Theresa of Calcutta. She was a nun and missionary who lead several organizations to help very poor and sick people. Her charities worked with counselling groups, orphanages, schools, mobile clinics, and people with HIV, tuberculosis, and leprosy across the world.
She was also criticized for the poor medical care in her organizations, for her stance against abortion and contraception, and her belief in the importance of suffering. She wasn’t agreeable nor compassionate all the time.
Though I really admire her life’s work, I certainly am not and don’t want to be like Mother Theresa of Calcutta. I enjoy comfort, I am not selfless, and I don’t want to spend my days working with the dying.
Second question: What other words describe being nice to you?
Once we define “nice” in a way that resolves the conflicts from the questions above, we can find our own definition of being nice while still staying true to who we really are.
Is being nice the same as being kind? Generous? Giving? Non-judgmental? Empathetic? Respectful? Selfless? Polite? Caring? Passive? Friendly? Likable? Compassionate? Considerate? Generous? Here are some definitions as per google dictionary to reflect on:
* Nice: pleasant; agreeable, satisfactory
* Kindness: the quality of being friendly, generous, and considerate
* Considerate: careful not to cause inconvenience or hurt to others
* Caring: displaying kindness and concern for others
* Polite: having or showing behavior that is respectful and considerate of other people
* Respect: due regard for the feelings, wishes, rights, or traditions of others
* Selfless: concerned more with the needs and wishes of others than with one’s own
* Passive: accepting or allowing what happens or what others do, without active response or resistance
* Friendly: kind and pleasant
* Likable: pleasant, friendly and easy to like
* Empathetic: showing an ability to understand and share the feelings of another
* Compassionate: feeling or showing sympathy and concern for others
* Generous: showing a readiness to give more of something, as money or time, than is strictly necessary or expected
* Courtesy: the showing of politeness in one’s attitude and behavior toward others
* Non-judgmental: avoiding moral judgments (having or displaying an excessively critical point of view)
I decided that I don’t want to be pleasant and agreeable all the time. I want to be free to dissent, to challenge the mass opinion, and to be authentic.
For me, being nice is about having respect. It is about having consideration for other people’s opinions, feelings, desires, and rights while still remaining respectful to myself. I can be respectful of others and myself at all times and still feel authentic.
I can respectfully disagree. I can respectfully take care of my own needs. I can respectfully assert myself. I can respectfully listen and interact. I can respect differences. I can practice respect in almost any situation.
But I can’t and won’t always be selfless, generous, likable, empathetic, compassionate, friendly, non-judgmental, caring, kind, nor polite. I may choose to do so in certain situations when it is congruent with my authentic self, but I won’t commit to doing it all the time. You shouldn’t have to deny your own needs nor your interests to be nice.
Third question: Should you act or be nice?
There is also a difference between displaying concern for others and being concerned for others. You can be concerned and not display it, and you can also force yourself to display concern but not be concerned. But you can’t force yourself to be concerned when you aren’t. The same way you can’t force yourself to feel and be nice if you’re not.
When you act nice and don’t mean it, you are inconsistent with who you are at the core. That is hard to sustain for long periods of time. And eventually it erodes trust with others.
You are human, and therefore you are entitled to have flaws and to not be a spiritual hero. You are entitled to be nice on some days and not nice in others. You are entitled to your needs and desires. You are entitled to put yourself first, to not be generous when you don’t want to be generous, and to not be likable when it doesn’t feel right, as long as you do it without disrespecting others.
Find your real definition of nice. It shouldn’t feel hard, forceful, or negative. Remember that even your role models were not nice, caring, and selfless with everyone at all times. Examine what makes sense for you in most situations. Don’t define your fixed identity with occasional behaviors. It will only confuse you, reduce your self-confidence, and reduce the real impact that you can bring to the world.
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How to Appreciate Your Body (During COVID-19 and Always)
EDITOR’S NOTE: You can find a number of helpful coronavirus resources and all related Tiny Buddha articles here.
“Imagine if we obsessed about the things we loved about ourselves.” ~Unknown
I used to have a plaque with this quote prominently displayed in my waiting room. Sadly, it’s somehow gotten misplaced over the years.
What I remember most about the plaque was how it engaged, or disengaged, the people who noticed it. Did they mention the quote when they came into my office? Pointedly ignore it? Let me know that self-love is what they want for themselves? Or express skepticism that they would never get to that point in their relationships with their bodies (if they even had such a relationship)?
It was the latter group, primarily made up of women in their forties and fifties that I most loved to challenge.
“What’s your relationship with your body like?” or “When did you stop focusing on what you liked about your body,” I’d ask.
The answers I heard were often things like “My body changed after my pregnancy,” or “I hate seeing pictures of myself with wrinkles.”
As a woman who has surpassed the half century mark myself, I completely related—things aren’t quite the same as in my twenties.
Of course, focusing on the perfect body spans gender. Many men I know joke about or bemoan their “man boobs,” and people who identify as non-binary sometimes hate gendered body parts, like hips or breasts.
The world I know most intimately is my own, that of a mid-life woman. TV, magazines, and diet talk constantly remind me of the young, smooth, skinny ideal.
You would think that with a worldwide pandemic happening, these pressures would disappear. Well, they haven’t. Who’s seen the Facebook meme entitled “When You Meet Your Friends After Quarantine,” which shows toddler girls baring their admittedly adorable bellies which they bonk together? My takeaway: bellies may be cute on toddlers, but not on me.
Or what about the one that shows a much larger Little Debbie of snack cake fame now depicted as Big Deborah? The message: chubby cheeks and extra pounds are not attractive. Watch out. And then there’s talk of the dreaded quarantine fifteen and how to avoid it.
The message that I should hate my body is alive and well.
So how do I begin to combat these messages? The quote at the beginning reminds me to shift to my thinking to the positive. I’m working on it. I’ve started to ask myself hard questions. What’s positive about my body? What am I grateful for?
While I’ve found it helpful to think about these things, a gratitude journaling and practices have spurred the most movement toward the positive. The positive present, that is, rather than the losses of the past (like that flat teenage stomach) or the anxiety of the future “quarantine fifteen.”
Cultivating A Body Gratitude Practice
I offer my body gratitude in many ways. Journaling is one. Gratitude journals can be simple, such as a bulleted list of how I am grateful to my body (e.g., for health, mobility, endurance).
I can also answer questions more overarching questions like “How has my body been a friend through the years?”
As I ask these questions, I tune in to the sensations in my body. How do I feel in my body when I offer this gratitude? It’s often a lightness in my chest or a fullness in my heart.
It can be a challenge to keep a body gratitude journal, so I’d like to offer some examples.
I am grateful to my body for having the endurance to take a walk each day.
I am grateful to my body for persevering through a difficult pregnancy. Yes, it’s not the perfect body, but it’s given me the gift of a talented, unique daughter.
I also love to choose a daily card from Louis Hay’s “Healthy Body Deck.” It’s shifts my perspective when I read these gratitude affirmations and thank parts of my body I never considered.
For instance, one card says “I love my feet. I walk upon this planet safe and secure, always moving forward toward my good.” I never thought of all the things my feet do for me.
Some of the cards are funny, such as thanking my spleen for its role, but they help me to connect and laugh.
I also try to notice opportunities for gratitude throughout my day. During a recent grocery trip I was talking to a cashier, who described her fears about COVID-19. Her teenage son had struggled with some past health issues and she was concerned about him becoming sick. It reminded me to thank my body for having a great immune system that keeps my fear levels low, and it provided the basis for my nightly journal entry.
Finally, body gratitude practices can involve ritual. This is a work in progress for me, but I offer it to others as an alternative. Love baths? Fill a tub with warm water and bubbles, light some candles, and play some music. Take the time for a soak, letting your body have permission to relax and recharge and thanking yourself for getting through another day of keeping yourself and your family safe.
You—and your body—are doing a wonderful job getting through this crisis. Appreciating yourself can help you stay healthy and enable you to use this time for growth and self-connection.
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The Most Important Lessons We Can Take from This Pandemic
EDITOR’S NOTE: You can find a number of helpful coronavirus resources and all related Tiny Buddha articles here.
“And the people stayed home. And read books, and listened, and rested, and exercised, and made art, and played games, and learned new ways of being, and were still. And listened more deeply. Some meditated, some prayed, some danced. Some met their shadows. And the people began to think differently.” ~Kitty O’Meara
While this pandemic is turning out to be a very confusing and difficult time for many people, it is undoubtedly giving humanity an incredibly rare opportunity to learn some challenging lessons. I believe these lessons will trigger a much-needed change of perspective for how we do things on this planet and will hopefully enable us to turn over a new leaf.
For so long it felt that we had been living in a way that went against everything that is natural and sacred.
We had been living in a way that neither serves humans nor the natural world, and yet we continued on this path seemingly powerless to stop what we were doing.
It’s as if we were all part of this machine that kept on chugging along, but no one could find the stop button. Well, that stop button has arrived and it’s not like anything we could have ever imagined.
Over the last several weeks we have seen a massive change in our priorities, and the economy has echoed this to a great degree. Sales of food and health products have gone through the roof, while sales of clothes, makeup, cars, etc, (you know, the stuff we don’t really need but think we need to attain some kind of happiness) has plummeted.
In my personal life, I can feel that my priorities have massively shifted due to this pandemic, and it has been eye-opening to see how so much can change in such a short space of time.
I recently found myself looking at pictures I had taken a couple months ago of me and my daughter out and about, and suddenly this strange thought came to my mind: In some way, life will never be the same again.
I think most of us are wondering what the future will hold and how this pandemic will change the way we do things, but I feel there is no way to escape the change in perspective that it will bring.
This is our silver lining, and it will hopefully allow us to look back on this time and feel there were some benefits.
Here are six valuable lessons I think we will learn from this.
1. The power of stillness.
Our lives were put on pause, many were forced to work from home, and we can longer travel unless necessary.
With this, we were given the power of stillness and the opportunity to unapologetically slow down. There is no other situation other than an outbreak of a virus where our world would come to such a pause. This will most likely be an opportunity that we never get again (and ironically, we are all hoping we won’t ever get again).
As such, now more than ever—for those who are still under lockdown—this is the time to go within and be still with yourself. Heal, remove emotional blockages, meditate, and practice yoga. Take this opportunity to do the inner work that you previously had no time for. If ever there was time for personal transformation, it’s now.
And as the lockdowns begin to lift perhaps we will see the value in living a quieter and more peaceful life.
2. Friends and family mean everything.
Probably the most difficult part of this journey for most people is being separated from their friends, family, and maybe even a romantic partner.
I once heard someone say that “connection is something that all humans need, but we are just not very good at it.” Who here feels that maybe they took human interaction for granted before this? I will raise my hand to that.
Connection is something that is so critical for our emotional and mental well-being, yet it something we often take for granted.
After this is over, I think people will reach out to each other like never before and everyone will be so overjoyed to see their loved ones again. And just maybe we might be a little bolder and share our smiles and greetings with those we don’t even know.
3. Nature continues to thrive even if the world has shutdown.
For many during this lockdown, including myself, nature has been a life saver. Whether we spend time in our garden, walk through a park, do gardening, grow food (I grant that not everyone has been able to enjoy these luxuries), or simply poke our head out of our window for some fresh air and sunlight, the serenity of nature has been something we can rely on. While the world stopped, nature remained constant.
Incredible stories have also emerged about wild animals taking over quiet city centers and dolphins returning to waters that they haven’t been spotted in for hundreds of years. Nature never stops, and the sad truth is that less human activity has meant that nature has been able to thrive in a way that most of us haven’t seen in our lifetime.
Yet, maybe seeing nature in full force with all its beauty will prompt us to create new systems where humans and nature can thrive together. I can’t bear to think of losing our new fresh air or the animals that have finally felt safe enough to come closer to us. Perhaps this will be the big wake up call we needed.
Either way, I believe humans will make a renewed relationship with nature and just hopefully this might lead to big environmental change.
4. Material goods mean nothing.
As I have already mentioned, this pandemic has forced us to completely rearrange our priorities, and I can’t help but feel this is a good thing. What good are material things when your health, safety, and access to food are jeopardized? They mean zero at times like this, which I think just helps us put into perspective exactly what we should be prioritizing in our lives.
Since realizing this virus was going to be something that was very serious, I have barely bought anything that isn’t absolutely essential. And of course, this doesn’t mean that I am done with buying beautiful clothes or things to make my life more enjoyable, but it has cast a light on how little I actually need and what truly makes me happy.
5. Our health is gold.
Health is something we so easily take for granted until it is at risk. The possibility of our health taking a downturn has made many of us pay more attention to our nutrition intake and cleanliness. Some of us have even been taking preventative health measures and steps to boost our immune system.
If we have a working body with no serious physical ailments, we should be beyond grateful!
6. Essential workers are heroes.
Every good story needs its hero, and in the story that is playing out on our planet right now, our heroes are of course key workers—healthcare workers, delivery drivers, bus and train drivers, and those who work in the supermarkets and food distribution. These are the people who are keeping everything going and right now risking their health and safety every day to do it.
In the past, so many of these professions were deemed as jobs that require little skill or don’t deserve much pay, but right now there is no saying what we would do without these people.
I hope in the future these professions shall be seen with high esteem, and the soldiers fighting on the frontline will be remembered. If this pandemic is teaching us one thing, it is not to take anyone or anything for granted.
What Will Be the Outcome of All This?
I think everyone is wondering what exactly will come out of this crisis and whether we will really change our ways. Will we learn the lessons or go back to the way we were before—our unhealthy ‘normality’?
This is yet to be seen. However, as individuals we can make our own choices, and it is our individual choice that will make all the difference.
Let us learn from this situation and do what we can to preserve nature, to bring more stillness into our lives, and to never take people or our health and safety for granted again. As always, individual change and transformation will always triumph.
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The Challenge of Doing Less When You’re Used to Doing More
EDITOR’S NOTE: You can find a number of helpful coronavirus resources and all related Tiny Buddha articles here.
“I became an overachiever to get approval from the world.” ~Madonna
I have spent my entire life looking for more. More to do, more to achieve, and more to see.
I have always been a planner—meticulously planning everything from vacations to visits with friends to my life months (or years) ahead.
I plan because I’ve always wanted to fit in as much as possible in the finite time I was allotted. I never wanted to feel like time was wasted or opportunities to do or see something were taken for granted.
When plans went awry, my anxiety would overtake my entire body and make me feel like I had failed—even if the change was completely out of my control. I planned because I saw the space in front of me, and I wanted to fill it as perfectly as possible—with colors, themes, and vibrant things.
I never wanted to risk that this space would go empty or uncolored, and maybe that’s a reflection of how I see myself in some twisted way.
I have always been an overachiever—doing the bare minimum has never been an option for me. I started working part-time at sixteen, joined every club I could, and maintained side hustles in college before side hustles were a thing.
I had to add to my responsibilities constantly because I thought that was the only way I could make myself stand out. And, to be fair, it did. I saw the benefits of busting my butt, but I also lamented the chances I missed to slow down and look at the scene and just breathe rather than climbing the mountain relentlessly.
In every job I held, I would walk in each day and ask myself, “How can I go above and beyond?” I was always looking to improve or to impress.
When this was recognized, it was like being dosed with relief like a Gatorade bucket after a football game. Yes, I mattered. Yes, I was seen. So, I kept going, carrying the pressure of constant achievement. With this came that constant worry of, “Is this enough?” Rather than slowing down to find the answer, I’d add more to my plate “just in case.”
I have always been a romantic—and I have royally messed up my relationships with giving far more than I received. Was I doing enough? Could I be doing more? Always trying to be as compassionate and as giving as possible.
Eventually, I toned this down and tried to “play it cool.” But that meant that inside my mind I was reeling wondering if low-key was working. Of course, I was so hyper-focused on someone else’s happiness that I never noticed mine debilitating time and time again. I was so concerned with being “perfect” that I lost who I was when I wasn’t trying to achieve perfection.
I never stopped to ask whether the other person was meeting me in the middle of giving me what I needed. Instead, I felt the weight of the world to hold relationships together.
If I had tried to do less, then maybe I would’ve given them space to do more. Or, maybe, if I had paused, I could’ve seen what was in front of me and saved myself multiple heartbreaks. I found out too late that true love wasn’t found on a to-do list.
I have always been a dreamer—imagining a life that had more than the one I was in. Of course, there’s a lot of beauty in my endless daydreams and fantasies. Some of them came to be, but, honestly, it meant that I was always living in my head or a few chapters ahead.
I was always writing the next book before I finished reading the one I had already started. I couldn’t enjoy the word, the sentence, or even the page I was on. Even if, for a moment, my life was seemingly coming together from all of the overachieving, planning, and romanticizing. Even if all of that paid off, then I was simply daydreaming about galivanting in a new, different life somewhere else.
It was as if my feet never touched the ground, and I’ve spent years running through time—wondering why I’ve never felt whole.
It wasn’t that I don’t believe in being a dreamer, but gosh I wish I let myself enjoy the dreams that had come true and the life that I had built in front of me instead of feeling the need to stick my head back up in the clouds for more.
I have spent my entire life, almost thirty years of it, doing more for the need to be seen, to be validated, to be worthy. I have spent so much time making “the most” of my time and, ironically, have lost so much time because of it. And now? In this weird world where all we have is time and we’re asked to slow down… it’s like I’m coming to a head-on collision with reality.
I’m finally seeing how tired my soul is from this constant running. Honestly, I’m really struggling with slowing down in a way that feels sustainable. I’m still spending way too many minutes wondering, when will this end? And I’m not spending enough time thinking, how can I make this moment I have—right now—enough?
Now, the world put up a speed limit, and it’s showing me just how much I lived in the fast lane.
It’s challenging to slow down on purpose without feeling like I’m wasting time. But maybe that’s why I needed this. So that I didn’t miss the next thirty years of my life seeking more. Because I am forced to see all that I have acquired between the four walls of my heart and the four walls of my home, and there’s a lot of good in that. Because I’ve never really given myself the opportunity to just be happy with what’s in front of me.
It’s a lesson, ironically, in both humility and pride—being happy with the little things, but also being proud of what I was able to achieve to be here.
I have spent my entire life checking things off of a list and running on empty. Now, I finally have the opportunity to stop and consider—what would make me feel full? What would make me feel whole? And the only thing I need to do right now to answer that question is breathe.
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My Cat Had Cancer and Taught Me How to Cope with Illness
“A cat purring on your lap is more healing than any drug in the world, as the vibrations you are receiving are of pure love and contentment.” ~St. Francis of Assisi
We all know what it is like to be sick. At some point in our lives we get the flu or a bad cold, but we know the course—get lots of rest and before you know it you are as good as new. But for some of us, we live with chronic illness.
Chronic illness brings with it day-to-day symptoms, the ones you cannot get away from. Coping with chronic illness is really tough.
You wonder if you will ever get well, grieve the things you used to do or want to do but can’t, stress about how to maintain employment, and feel invisible to those who don’t know what it is like to be sick.
Autoimmune illnesses affect 50 million people in the United States and includes over 100 illnesses (aarda.org). I have an autoimmune disease—Crohn’s disease. It is a chronic inflammatory bowel disease.
Crohn’s disease has many symptoms, which fluctuate day-to-day, and like all autoimmune diseases has remissions and relapses. I don’t know when I wake up if I am going to have a good day or a really bad day.
Some days it is overwhelming, but others I feel supported and hopeful that I will get better.
When my twenty-year-old cat Yochabel was diagnosed with bladder cancer, now two of us in the same home suffered with a chronic condition. As we faced our health challenges together, something remarkable happened.
She became a mirror of myself. I thought I was coping, but she challenged my current perceptions of illness. I had room for improvement as Yochabel, my dear cat companion, offered me lessons for coping.
Obviously, I didn’t have feline bladder cancer, but her condition, similar to my own, was chronic, and unpredictable. Similarly, treatment direction was unclear and despite seeing diverse specialists, opinions were confusing and conflicting.
Whether it is cancer, autoimmune disease, or another illness, there are common themes among them. I think of illness as painful, uncomfortable, disorienting, stressful, frustrating, and even depressing from time to time.
But to my surprise, Yochabel introduced me to a positive aspect of illness. Illness brought irreplaceable gifts to both our lives, one of which is gratitude.
Notice and Appreciate the Small Things in Life
When we know our time is limited with those we love, suddenly our perspective shifts. Instead of focusing on what we don’t have, we focus on what we have. Each day Yochabel was physically able to walk to her litter box I was grateful.
First thing in the morning, I ran into the room where she was sleeping, and when I saw her big beautiful green eyes wide open and heard her purring, I felt gratitude. I noticed that while I was able to appreciate these things in Yochabel, I couldn’t in myself.
My body, just like hers, was giving me many moments to be grateful for. Despite living with Crohn’s disease for decades, my body gifted me with the ability to walk to see Yochabel, the senses to see and hear her, and a heart that filled with love when I thought of her.
My body gave me life—a life that I could make the most of because it was my choice regardless of illness.
Being Present: One Step, One Moment at a Time
Throughout the ups and downs of adjusting to the bladder cancer, I noticed the stark contrast between Yochabel’s responses and my own. I wanted the answers to be clear and results from treatment immediate. I was impatient and outwardly frustrated.
Meanwhile, Yochabel’s life was consumed with frequent trips to her litter box. Back and forth each morning I watched her squat to urinate, return to her bed, and start the process all over again. Her pacing made me anxious and angry.
I asked myself again and again why is this happening to her? She didn’t deserve it.
I watched her take one step at a time, as though each trek to the litter box was a new one. I, on the other hand, accumulated her sufferings, each trek to the litter box being “stacked” on top of the prior ones as I angrily said, “Here we go again!”
Meanwhile she was calm and present in each step.
I wondered how does she do it?
Then I concluded, it was truly about being in the moment—taking one symptom at a time. The more we accumulate and stack symptoms, the harder it is to cope. One symptom at a time is more manageable.
I wondered if I could handle my symptoms one at a time.
It is almost as if she knew this was a process that her body had to unfold in its own time.
As I watched her presence and approach to a very annoying constellation of symptoms, I realized how much energy I expel trying to rush healing, obtain immediate answers, and get to the end of treatment. This negative response steals energy away from my healing in the form of stress.
Stress doesn’t help healing, it makes it worse. It was a major difference: Yochabel seemed to manage stress much better than I do.
It is All About Perception—We Are What We Think
One side effect of bladder cancer is bleeding. Despite my knowing this can be a common symptom of cancer, my perception of blood is “scary,” and painful.
In fact, it causes me to freak out!
Yochabel didn’t perceive blood as alarming. Therefore, every time she urinated blood, while I panicked, Yochabel remained present and calm until my nerves and actions alarmed her.
To my amazement, even while bleeding, she still purred and sought my companionship and meals.
I wondered if I could be this calm as my body did strange things; it would certainly be useful.
It was all about my perceptions.
Joy and Illness Can Coexist
The most perplexing to me was Yochabel’s ability to show a joy and zest for life despite what I perceived as uncomfortable—cancer.
While bleeding, urgently urinating, and dealing with her own lifestyle changes she was upbeat, kind, patient, and obviously joyful.
I couldn’t think of a day in my life where I exuded outward or inward joy while in a Crohn’s flare. Not to mention, I was irritable towards those around me when I was suffering.
Yochabel, staying in the moment, never allowed her illness to displace her joy or relationship with me.
She was always kind and full of gratitude.
Pet Companions Help Us Heal
Living with chronic illness inspires me to continue developing and refining what my body and mind need to heal.
Through the years I have explored many approaches for healing Crohn’s disease and strengthening my immune system.
I tried physical interventions: diet, routine blood work, and taking vitamins and supplements and emotional interventions: seeing a licensed mental health therapist and addressing the impact of childhood trauma and stress on my health.
These were all effective in their own ways, but sometimes healing can be simpler than we think.
Our pet companions are critical assets to our healing.
Not only do they provide us unconditional love and support, but they are some of our greatest teachers. In the presence of a pet companion, there is no such thing as invisible illness.
They see us for who we really are and their wisdom and intuition is something all humans can benefit from.
Hold on to the Gifts in Front of You
Illness is life changing for caretakers and patients.
However, the greatest lesson I learned from Yochabel is that some of the difficulty is of my own creation.
Rushing the human body beyond its natural ability to heal is counterproductive, anger and frustration toward loved ones and oneself is damaging, negative perceptions create stress and confusion.
Just because illness is present in our lives does not mean we have to surrender to it. We still have our joy, quality time with loved ones, ability to make decisions moment to moment, and hope that things can get better.
While Yochabel had the cancer, I seemed to be the victim and the “sicker” of the two of us.
Why?
Because she didn’t let go of any of these gifts.
Her focus was holding on to them moment by moment and when I do the same, I can cope much more easily.
*You can read more about Yochabel’s wisdom, and her end-of-life story, here.
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Lost Your Job? Here Are 4 Things That Might Help
EDITOR’S NOTE: You can find a number of helpful coronavirus resources and all related Tiny Buddha articles here.
“Life isn’t always fair. Some people are born into better environments. Some people have better genetics. Some are in the right place at the right time. If you’re trying to change your life, all of this is irrelevant. All that matters is that you accept where you are, figure out where you want to be, and then do what you can, today and every day, to hold your head high and keep moving forward.” ~Lori Deschene
Like millions of people these days, I have lost my job. But unlike millions of people, I’ve now lost the same job twice within a year. Which, strangely, makes me feel somewhat prepared for it. And that’s why I’d like to share with you how I dealt with the situation then, and how I’m dealing with it now.
I learned I was being made redundant the first time on March 26, 2019, and this time on the March 26, 2020, both times due to a “lack of business.” The law in Sweden says the last ones to join a company should be the first ones out, and I happened to be one of the last ones in.
After being let go the first time—having an uncertain future in front of me and dealing with feelings of unworthiness, lack of direction, and grief—I was told I would be rehired a couple months later due to an increase in the volume of business.
What a relief. After all that inner turmoil, I was considered worthy again and welcomed back. Back to a life that I knew well, that I would return to refreshed, after having had a break from it—and having been “on the other side,” looking at what I’d lost, now appreciative for what I’d regained. Not a perspective many have had.
It felt like a rollercoaster of an experience that made me braver in the face of abysses. I began to stare down from the top realizing that if I’d felt pushed to it again, I’d eventually fly. Being laid off, after all, was not a fatal fall. Not even a failure. It was a test for my wings.
You can have many different reactions to being laid off, depending on how much you like your job, how much you depend on it, and how much you have invested in it. I believe that for most of us there’s a bitter feeling, a sense of betrayal and failure. That after you have dedicated yourself to your company’s mission, day after day, hour after hour, you are suddenly seen as disposable, unworthy.
And it’s a strange thing, that even for those who didn’t enjoy their job, there’s a certain nostalgia when they think that they won’t be returning to that place again, and won’t meet the people they used to despise seeing on Monday mornings.
Pretty much like one of those breakups when all of a sudden, the person you hated when you broke up, turns into a person you can’t live without.
That wasn’t the case for me when I got laid off. I enjoyed my job and wasn’t happy about the news.
However, I have done enough personal development work to help me to take what happens in my life with a grain of salt, and just enough distance to handle the situation gracefully. That’s why I want to share my perspective with you.
Here are some of the thoughts that have helped me through being laid off, both times.
My job is not my life.
I have always strived to create a routine that would remind me that my job is a part of my life, but not my entire life.
It’s easy to get immersed in all that’s happening at work—all the personal dynamics, all the challenges, victories, projects, meetings, trips, etc.—to such a deep level that we perceive our work as our entire life. After all, many times work is what we do, what we talk and think about, the whole day, every day.
But I noticed that every time I would feel most frustrated with work, I was doing precisely that: looking at work as if it was my entire life. And if things were not going well at work, I’d feel as if my whole life wasn’t going well. Every time I put things in perspective and saw work as just one part of my life, my frustrations would soften.
At the moment, after being laid off, this kind of strategy is absolutely essential. We need to see our employment as one part of our life (an essential one, of course), and we need to see what our lives are beyond our job. Now is the perfect opportunity to see what’s there, beyond that big chunk of time and energy we call work.
And if you feel like nothing is left, pay more attention. Who do you have around you? What are the things that interest you the most? What are the things that you’re happy to do even without a paycheck? And what gives you some pleasure or relief when you’re feeling down? This is a time to pay attention to yourself and discover who you are under the veil of old routines.
My career doesn’t define me.
To a certain extent, you might feel your career defines you, especially if you feel that your job defines your life, or if you have spent most of your life building a career that aligns with your interests. However, the status of your career doesn’t make you a better or worse person, or a more or less valuable person to society. And this is a crucial point to take in.
Losing our job might make us feel that we’re no longer useful in the community, and that can give a deep sense of unworthiness. But, how the world is being shaped right now, hopefully, we’ll return to work that is more conscious, relevant, and less harmful to all.
If you feel like you lost your sense of identity when you lost your job, work on finding your identity in this crisis. Aren’t these the times that truly define us? How we deal with uncertainty and tough times?
It’s okay to grieve.
With so much advice on positivity everywhere, it’s not surprising that we feel bad for feeling blue or lacking energy and patience, and we think we should somehow be instantly productive. When we’re struggling, it’s helpful to stop and ask: Is it reasonable what I’m demanding of myself? Is it reasonable today? Can I take a break? Can I be a little kinder?
No matter how well you take losing your job, you’re still going through a massive life change. The people you used to meet, the places you used to go, and what you used to do every day will all change. That’s massive. So it’s okay to grieve that loss. Give yourself space to experience the pain, without judgment and unrealistic expectations.
The unknown is the birthplace of possibility.
Every time I took a leap of faith in my life, I was met with both tough times and gratifying achievements. And life has always felt sweeter in the face of those setbacks and victories because it was then I felt truly alive.
Sure, it’s great, and necessary, to have security in life, but our true nature is wired for uncertainty. In reality, every morning, no one knows what the day will hold. You might fall in love that day or lose a loved one. You might be promoted, or maybe lose your job. That’s the nature of life, unpredictable. But it’s also that unpredictability that holds space for great things to happen. Or else, why would you buy a lottery ticket, take a trip to an exotic place, or start a new relationship with a stranger you fell in love with?
Can we rewire our thinking to see this tough time through the lens of possibility? I believe so.
We just have to have faith in the unknown and be patient and kind to ourselves. We can believe the world is ending, or we can believe the world is transforming. We can cry because we have lost our job or smile because we have gained an opportunity.
After all, the universe is always hiring, and you’re only a short time away from being rehired.
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Why Journaling is the Best Thing to Do During a Crisis
EDITOR’S NOTE: You can find a number of helpful coronavirus resources and all related Tiny Buddha articles here.
“The difference between despair and hope is just a different way of telling stories from the same set of facts.” ~Alain de Botton
When I was told that the man I loved had a terminal illness, I instinctively reached for my journal. When I was asked to evacuate my home ahead of a category-5 cyclone three short weeks after his funeral, the first thing I threw into the back of my car was a large box with my journals.
That was nearly a decade ago.
Last month, when I stood in front of the empty shelves at my local supermarket, I was surprised to be instantly back in the grip of the fear and panic I felt during the crisis I had braved almost a decade ago. So I did the most logical thing. I took a deep breath, located the stationary aisle—which thankfully was still fully-stocked—and I bought myself a large new notebook.
The next day, as the world prepared to go into lock-down, I missed the chance to return to my partner and my home in Vietnam.
Depression and anxiety promptly came to visit, threatening to turn my self-isolation into another painful chapter of my life. But I know that I am more resilient than I think I am, and I instantly turned to my number one coping strategy. I opened my new notebook and started writing my Covid-19 journal.
This is a challenging time for all of us, and we are all affected in different ways by this global pandemic. I don’t know how my partner and I will cope with the challenge of having to conduct our relationship across closed borders, via Zoom and Messenger, with no certainty when we might see each other again.
But I know that writing will be there for me, as it has been during every crisis I have been through. Regular journaling has trained me to be my own therapist. Writing things down is an act of self-care. It’s like opening the door to my heart to see what’s in there and allowing myself to sit with all of it.
Writing through the grief of my husband’s death and the aftermath of a natural disaster, I learned that we can cultivate resilience by allowing ourselves to experience our feelings, both good and bad.
As I learned the hard way, writing builds resilience because it allows us to process, release, and make meaning of challenging events and complex emotions.
Writing things down during a crisis is not only helpful as a way of processing and releasing our emotions—it is also a way to document what is happening as it unfolds.
This strange and unprecedented moment in time sometimes feels like the world is collectively writing a new chapter. There is the official narrative, there is an abundance of alternative narratives floating around the internet, and then there are our personal narratives and the ways we as individuals cope with this crisis.
Our memories will fade —though we’ll probably always remember that toilet paper was the first thing that ran out during a pandemic—but by keeping a diary and writing things down as they happen, we create a record of this unique historical moment.
Writing is also a way to enter the creative flow, which is a great antidote to feelings of stress and anxiety. When we become absorbed in the process of writing, we momentarily step out of the chaos and the grief around us and into a safe zone of calm and flow.
For many of us, self-isolation brings loneliness. Writing can be a great companion in times of loneliness. My diary has always been my best friend during difficult times. Writing can also be a safe place to retreat to for those of us who are assailed by a sense of cabin fever as members of a household suddenly have to live in close proximity with each other 24/7.
It’s easy for conflict and irritation to arise in confined living environments. I think of my diary as my sacred space where I can say things I don’t dare to say out loud, where I can vent, rage and reflect and most importantly, where I enter into a dialogue with myself.
Here are some suggestions for starting your own Covid-19 journal:
1. Write about how you feel right now.
Allow yourself to give voice to feelings that you might be holding back for the sake of protecting others or because you feel ashamed.
Write about what feels particularly hard about this crisis. Begin by brainstorming words that describe your emotional state right now. Think of it as making an inventory of the feelings in your heart. You might even find that you feel stronger and calmer than you thought you did.
2. Write about a time when you overcame a crisis.
Remembering a time when you were resilient and got through a difficult emotional turning point will help you to believe in your own strength.
Bring to mind a significant difficult emotional experience. Make sure it’s something in the past that you can safely write about.
Begin to write about the experience in the first person. Bring the experience alive by giving concrete sensory detail, i.e. what smells, sounds and tastes do you remember? Maybe you want to make reference to the weather or the color of the car you drove. Use word pictures to get back in touch with the feelings you had during that time.
3. Write a diary.
Writing a diary about the current pandemic can be as simple as writing about your day. You may write about the things you did and did not do, the people you interacted with, the things you ate, the words you read, the news you watched, the things you did to care for yourself or the ways you allowed the news to affect your anxiety levels…
Write about anything you’d like to capture about this day. This could be a simple brain dump. Or you could focus on the quirky things that happened today. The things that only a month ago, you couldn’t have imagined doing right now – things like having virtual sundowner drinks or virtual cups of tea via Zoom with your best friends.
If you’re writing first thing in the morning, you might write about your dreams, the quality of your sleep, or about the day before.
Be sure to include sensory detail to bring your world alive, i.e. write about the flowers that are in bloom right now, the smells during your daily walk, the noises that you can hear through the thin walls of your apartment etc.
You never know, your Covid-19 diary may become the foundation of a memoir or something to leave behind for the grandkids.
4. Write to practice self-compassion.
In times of crisis, when we experience suffering, fear, or anxiety, it is important to give our hearts shelter. Self-compassion can help us feel less vulnerable and disconnected during this time of self-isolation. It’s also a great way to silence the voice of the inner critic who will be quick to tell you that you are poor at home-schooling or that you are a bad partner.
Think of self-compassion as being like a warm embrace. Or as expert Dr Kristin Neff says, like speaking to yourself with the same care and kindness you would use towards a good friend.
Write for ten to fifteen minutes about what you need from yourself right now to feel less vulnerable, less cranky, less anxious… or whatever you may be feeling right now. Another great way to use writing as a self-compassion practice is to write a letter to yourself from the perspective of a good friend, assuring you that whatever happens you’re loved and cared for.
5. Write a gratitude journal.
Gratitude is a secret superpower that helps to build resilience and happiness. Too often we focus on what we lack—and right now we lack a lot of things that we used to take for granted only a short while ago. Gratitude is a way of looking at what is abundant and good in our lives, despite the current crisis.
Writing a gratitude journal can be as simple as listing five things you are grateful for at the end of every day: your warm bed at night, access to drinking water, having a shelter etc.
Try to be more specific than just saying “I am grateful for my bed.” Tell your diary why you are grateful for having a bed, why you are grateful for the job that sometimes overwhelms you, or the kids that drive you mad during this pandemic.
A good way to get started with a daily writing practice is to do a short meditation to settle your mind and to get into stillness. Then set the timer on your phone for ten to fifteen minutes and simply write without stopping to think or edit, trusting the pen to lead the way.
I’ve kept a journal from the age of eleven, which makes me a seasoned diarist, yet during the current global crisis I am often feeling unfocussed and unmotivated.
I tell myself that that’s okay, it’s part of the process of adapting to our new normal. But I always try to capture my new normal, even if I only write a quick list of things that stood out for me on a given day. It’s a way to stay connected to my inner voice and to write this new chapter one page and one breath at a time.
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How to Appreciate Life (Even During a Global Pandemic)
EDITOR’S NOTE: You can find a number of helpful coronavirus resources and all related Tiny Buddha articles here.
“Life is what happens when you’re busy making plans.” ~John Lennon
When I was in my late twenties I went on a trip with my mom and brother to Scotland.
Though I was a bit trepidatious about spending so much time with my family, I was excited for the trip too. When it finally arrived, I couldn’t wait to see the gorgeous Highlands, tour ancient castles, and eat endless amounts of shortbread. When we got there, I did exactly that, and it was incredible.
But though I loved my mom to the moon and back, like many parent-child relationships, she also got on my nerves a lot. As the trip progressed, I found myself annoyed at how many pictures she took, her repetition of the same stories, and how late she’d sleep (and snore) in the mornings while I itched to get out exploring.
Lack of contact with my friends and a lack of personal space from my family had me crawling out of my skin with impatience and frustration.
I’d listen to Eckhart Tolle’s The Power of Now each morning as I drank my coffee; his reminders to stay present in the moment (the “now”) reminded me it was pointless to “argue with reality” and wish I wasn’t where I was. But inevitably, by the end of the day I found myself counting the sleeps until I got to fly home and sink back into normal life.
What I couldn’t have known on that trip was that my mom would die of a heart attack mere months after getting back to the states. The pictures she was so bent on taking every five minutes would be her last few captures of earth; the conversations we had over hotel breakfasts would be some of our last mother-daughter interactions.
I couldn’t have known it at the time, but I’d soon ache for her repetitive stories, miss shoving the pillow over my ears as she snored, and long for a “do over” of certain moments where I acted like a brat.
In the years since she’s been gone (and through a lot of self-work) I’ve forgiven myself for being human and wishing my time on that trip away—but that experience taught me that we can never take time, life, or the people in it for granted.
Though it’s easy to forget, life is always only happening in the present, and good old Eckhart Tolle is still right when he reminds me (repeatedly) of the power of now.
But however well I learned this lesson after my mom’s death, this feeling of wanting to fast forward into the future is one I’m noticing a lot lately, both in myself and the culture as a whole.
The Coronavirus pandemic has caused many normal parts of life to screech to a halt, and it sort of feels like life itself is actually halted too. After all, for those lucky enough to not be ill (or have ill loved ones), the changes to daily life seem like a giant “pause” button has been pressed on our world—like we’ve stepped into some dystopian movie.
When will I be able to go back to work?
When will we know that the curve has flattened?
When will I feel safe in a crowd again?
When will this be over?
When we watch those dystopian movies, we know that eventually we’ll be able to get up from the movie theater, throw our popcorn bucket away, and continue with regular life.
But this current version of the world isn’t a movie: it is real life, and though it feels anything but normal, there’s no one holding a giant remote keeping us on pause. Though the roads are empty and the grocery shelves bare, the calendar pages still fly by and each day that passes is one of a limited number we each have in life.
If losing my mom unexpectedly taught me anything, it’s that I don’t want to wish life away, even when things feel bleak, overwhelming, or downright scary. Life is happening right now, and there are ways we can continue to live it while still holding space for the surrealness of it all.
In the spirit of being present with what is and making friends with even an uncomfortable reality, I offer you some tried and true steps for staying present with life—whatever it may be bringing.
1. Start your day intentionally
In the most normal of circumstances it’s tempting to start the day by grabbing our phones, and in the midst of a pandemic it can feel almost responsible to check the news at the crack of dawn. But unless we’re actually headed out the door at the very moment our feet hit the ground, there’s no reason to make a screen (or the news and opinions on it) the first thing that we see.
Starting our day with things outside our immediate reality can introduce panic, anxiety, and a frightening picture of what the future day or week might hold.
Before interfacing with the world, I’ve found that spending at least a half hour with just myself (and the family right in front of me) can ground me in the present and equip me with the foundation to face what’s going on elsewhere.
Within this time, I imagine how I want my day to go: How do I want to feel, respond, or show up to whatever happens? Yes, imagining the day ahead involves leaving the present—but in a way that lays a foundation of protection for each future moment that the day will bring.
2. Check in with what’s real
What’s actually real to me right now? Not what’s on the news, not what I wish were happening, but what is right in front of me?
I do this by asking myself: How am I feeling physically, emotionally, spiritually? I babble with my baby and “talk” to her about what I see, hear, smell, taste, and feel.
Though it is responsible to stay informed about community guidelines and general advisories about the current pandemic, checking in with our senses and what is truly real in our world can keep us from zooming forward into the imagined dystopian future.
3. Take off the productivity pressure and slow down
Regular life is often filled with lots of rushing: rushing to work, dropping the kids off, walking the dog, or getting that “thing” accomplished and behind you. Being quarantined has abruptly cut off much of that “hustle” mentality, but we sneaky humans find ways to hold onto our comforting (if unhealthy) habits.
One of those habits is the tendency to stay busy. During this “stay at home order” I’ve seen a productivity push emerge: a pressure to take this time to learn, create, accomplish, perfectly schedule your children, organize community initiatives, and do it all without physical support from your regular village.
If you’ve got the bandwidth to use this time in a “productive” way that feels good, more power to you— there’s nothing wrong with accomplishing when it comes from a place of inspiration or power. But if, like many of us, you’re struggling to do even the smaller tasks in life right now, I encourage you to reject this push for productivity and lean into the slowness that this time has created.
If it’s tougher than usual to get ready for the day, practice noticing everything about what getting ready for the day entails: “Right now I’m combing my hair, now I’m feeding the dog, now I’m getting into the shower.”
As you notice (and say) what you’re actually doing, allow yourself to just be doing that thing—not shaming yourself over the language you’re not learning or wondering why working from home isn’t as smooth as you thought it might be.
Leaning into slowness, noticing and staying with every individual action taken, and giving yourself permission to be overwhelmed (and likely slower than usual) is a key to staying present with life exactly as it is right now.
4. Be a time traveler
During the Scotland trip, I wasn’t particularly grateful for my mom, because being with her felt so normal: after all, I’d never not lived in a world with her in it. Now, however, I’d be so grateful to wake up to her snoring or to hear her re-tell the same story about Buford the run-away cow.
Because I’ve lost her, I realize how precious the time I had with my mom was—and the sobering but truest fact about life (in even the best of times) is that we will eventually lose everything.
Everything will someday be rendered precious, because the nature of our lives is impermanence. Though I doubt any of us will miss the fear or heartbreak of this pandemic, we just might miss the extra time with our family, the unique ways people have been kind to each other, or the incredible global connection we’ve experienced by going through the same thing at the same time as every other human on the planet.
Kind of like how we might be envious of our former selves that (mere months ago) were going to basketball games and brushing up against people in sweaty yoga classes, our future selves might someday miss these strange times, if only because we hunkered down and spent them with people who are no longer in our lives, or parenting children who are now grown and out of the house.
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Though the experiences are decidedly different, I see some parallels between the sudden death of my mother and the current moment in time.
After my mom died, I kept trying to gather pieces of myself and fit them back together: I was waiting for the day that things would feel normal again. But my relationships, goals, and every thought going forward felt different…because I was.
Similarly, when the world, our communities, and individual lives return to what one might call normal, these things likely won’t feel the same. Our world will now be different because we are.
But rather than grasping at the familiar of yesterday or projecting into an imagined tomorrow—I hope you’ll join me in holding space for the mourning, destruction, and transformation that’s happening both collectively and within each one of us.
Yes, things are difficult at present, but as the great Ram Dass said, let’s be here now.
This—right now—is our life, and while we still have the choice, let’s decide each day how we’d like to live it.
