Tag Archives: isolation

Thoughtful Thursday #295 – Trauma Recovery

Standard

According to Google: trauma recovery is: in general recovery is the ability to live in the present without being overwhelmed by the thoughts and feelings of the past. Central to the experience of trauma is helplessness, isolation and the loss of power and control. The guiding principles of trauma recovery are the restoration of safety and empowerment.

Here’s an excellent article from Psychology Today giving more information and insight into recovery. Hope it helps.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/articles/200111/recovering-trauma

 

 

Solitude Is Great Until It Turns To Isolation.

Standard

I cherish alone time, lots of it, but I can take it to the extreme until it becomes isolation.

We are social creatures by nature and without being social we can lose self-esteem, and self-confidence.

Isolation has a way of creeping up on us and separating us from friends, real world interactions, causes anxiety, you feel like you are in captivity in a cage, and detached from any healthy interactions.

Social media does not help, it lends itself into isolating us even more, plus it encourages the feelings of exclusion and an unrealistic idea that others lives are better than yours. Isolation also causes social anxiety. There is hope. Change is always possible.

Here are some suggestions to cure isolation:

Talk to everyone you meet.

Accept invitations even if you don’t think you want to go.

Build relationships.

Spend less time on social media.

Reach out and have an actual phone conversation instead of just social media.

Leave the house.

With a little bit of discipline and investment of your time you can get out of isolation and back into life. And if life is too much you can always go back to solitude but this time without the isolation.

 

Thoughtful Thursdays #188 – Move Closer

Standard

There are some pretty scary emotions that we run from. Our minds race with one disaster after another. Our society almost demands that we let it go and move on from tragedy or trauma. Letting go and moving on is not possible if we smother the very emotions we need to move closer to. Emotions like fear, abandonment, isolation and worthlessness.

Move closer to the parts of you that you exiled. Move closer to the very emotions that scare you. Move closer to approval for all strange events you survived. Move closer to being curious about your behavior. Move closer to the parts that are so hard to accept and love. Move closer to having compassion and kindness for yourself. Move closer to being intimate with our own courage. Move closer to deeply knowing who you are because you can’t help anyone else without helping yourself first.

It won’t be easy but so worth the effort. Your thinking will become more integrated and grounded. And an important perk to this effort is you will become more productive, understanding and confident.

Thoughtful Thursdays # 87 – Feeling Invisible

Standard

Ever notice a time you felt invisible in a crowd? People talk over you as if you don’t exist. Your opinion doesn’t matter.

Here’s some reasons why…..

1. You want to be part of the crowd but you really don’t like the crowd.

2. You try new things but only partially, not with your full heart.

3. You don’t realize how much you have to contribute to the world.

4. You are resisting the changes you need to make to be social.

Stop waiting for others.

Organize that road trip.

Make those phone calls.

Visit others even you are resisting.

Stop resisting our own life.

Start here and now with one small step.

It’s so much more fun to be with others than to be alone.

Even if it feels strange at first.

 

 

Thoughtful Thursdays # 62 – Suicide

Standard

Everyone goes to dark places in their mind. Most of the time people don’t show what they are really feeling. Myself included. It is not acceptable to bring up suicidal feelings in order to heal. No one really wants to get involved. No one wants to hear your pain because they have their own.

Sometimes instead of actually committing physical suicide we make choices to kill ourselves with toxic relationships, addictions of every kind, bad attitudes and an endless well of self destruction. For years and years we can go on and on from one painful situation to another and not understand why.

You know something is wrong but can’t see what it is. You try to talk it out to get clues to this mental state of pain but there are no clues. You read every book, go to therapy, pray, search and search for relief and it’s only temporary. Just when you think you have found it, bam it disappears throwing you back to square one. The numbness returns.

Yep that is what it feels like. Over thinking and running around with busy work so you don’t have to feel your body’s response to the confusion. It feels like you are being stabbed repeatedly over and over all over your body. The pain stings like bees and razors. You are cutting and bleeding invisibly. Occasionally you even do try to slit your wrists just to see if you can feel anything.  It hurts really bad this time. It is endless unless you are distracted in some way. Where is the relief, where is the relief?

It’s that drowning feeling of hopelessness and helplessness. The feelings are pervasive. There is no where to turn. The well of despair is filling quickly so you must figure out some way of not succumbing to killing yourself just yet.

Just wait, just wait.

Then the tears come and you can’t stop them. You bang your head against the wall and scream: the pain is too much, when will it stop. It never does. It just comes and goes.

There is the restlessness of meaningless, of emptiness of loneliness of where in the world am I and where do I belong, To whom do I belong. Feeling like a stranger on planet earth with no home. Your life becomes a self imposed prison of isolation.  It feels like choking on air and wetness at the same time. Unable to catch your breath in a panic.

Some how there is a tiny spark that makes you keep going. You are lucky to be so aware and strong. But you don’t believe it. Yes strong. But you don’t believe it. It takes courage to keep going. But you don’t believe it. Your strength comes from somewhere invisible. Call it survival, the divine, the journey, reliving trauma, the search, the longing to reach out anyway even if you fail. And you have failed so many, many times.

You try just one more time, even if you fail again at least it is temporary relief. Clinging to the hope that this time it will be different. Hoping that trying one more time will make a difference. Wishing for the best and preparing for the worst. Accepting what is unacceptable but not knowing what acceptable is just yet.

Getting up again, not letting anyone know how you feel it is easier to push them away. Even though you desperately need them.

You will try again and again and again and again. Maybe this time it will work.

There really is no other way than to try to either live in this world or die trying.

What will it be: suicide by choice or suicide by trying.

s

Codependent Denial Patterns

Standard

Codependents often…….

 

. have difficulty identifying what they are feeling

. minimize, alter, or deny how they truly feel

. perceive themselves as completely unselfish and dedicated to the well-being of others

. lack empathy for the feelings and needs of others

. mask pain in various ways such as anger, humor, or isolation

. express negativity or aggression in indirect and passive ways

. do not recognize the unavailability of those people to who they are attracted

from CODA.org

Affirmations # 19 Abundance

Standard

The Universe and all it’s powers are ending my poverty.
The Universe and all it’s powers are ending my isolation.

I always have whatever I need. The Universe takes very good care of me.

These affirmations are mine. You are welcome to change them to your preference. Write them 10 times each and repeat them many times during the day especially during the day and at bedtime, also in the mirror.