Tag Archives: trust

Jun7

Thoughtful Thursday #216 – Reparenting Yourself

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You grew up in a dysfunctional family, your self esteem is shot, your squirming over an embarrassing action, you want to disappear, you feel rejected at every turn. Sounds like your hurt inner child is expressing itself.

Then you probably need to reparent yourself.

Many of us have grown up in chaos, we have no recollection of who our true self is. That is OK. Of course you don’t know who you are in your core, it is impossible to know if you grew up with chaos and confusion. This is where you can learn to be your own best parent.

Will it be easy, probably not, your tip is the child within feels your feelings, the hurt child within acts those feeling out inappropriately. Here is where reparenting comes in. If you can give space to those trapped feelings, both good and bad, your parent self can step in and stop any extreme behavior, or at least give a time out.

There is much written about reparenting, here are a few resources:

Adult Children of Alcoholics

Strengthening My Recovery (Book)

Alcoholics Anonymous

Taming Your Outer Child (Book)

How to Reparent Yourself (Youtube video)

Google “Reparenting Yourself”

https://www.healingfromcomplextraumaandptsd.com/inner-child-healing (Website)

beatingtrauma.com (website of Elisabeth Corey, trauma survivor and life coach)

http://pete-walker.com (Therapist and trauma survivor)

You are worth the effort and can bear the temporary, uncomfortable feelings of doing this important inner work. Give it a try.

 

 

 

Jun2

Crying

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We cry in response to emotions like sadness, anger, grief,  frustration,  even happiness and joy.

There’s wailing, weeping, blubbering, lamenting, whimpering, all out bawling to the point of throwing up.

I have a hard time crying in front of others, however, in private I can really let it out. After crying I feel exhausted yet empty.

There is a soothing effect to crying, and can elicit support from others, relieve stress, restore emotional balance, and helps recover from grief.

No matter what you have heard or what you believe about crying: it’s perfectly OK to cry for as long as you want in any way that you want and you will not fall apart, you are not weak or defective.

I guarantee that even if the problem that causes you to cry persists, crying when you need it, will restore your balance.

Take that moment you need to deeply feel what is causing you to cry. You deserve to be relieved of pain.

 

May15

Resistance

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Resistance is something I live with every day. It’s like a chronic illness. For me resistance keeps me from doing the things that I really want to do. The things I know are really good for me. I have created an inner barrier that sabotages my own efforts. Why does this happen?

There are many reasons all of us live with resistance here are a few.

Fear, maybe be don’t want to know the truth or are fearful of become uncomfortable with self-knowledge. Fear of the unknown, not realizing the need for a change, maintaining an old habit. Those are just a few reasons.

Resistance is part of the human condition. No one really likes change or makes changes quickly.

Rather, resistance to change can disappear in a very natural way.  Examining ourselves is a deep way will cause change to happen painlessly, automatically, organically. Uncovering, unblending, undoing what we have always done is the catalyst for positive, dramatic change in tiny steps.

Take the time to objectively look at your own beliefs and actions. Why are you believing those beliefs, why are you taking those actions. Are these beliefs learned somewhere along your life or are they your own? Are the actions you are taking in your comfort zone, why?

Ask these questions in a non judgmental way so your inner life trusts you to reveal the information you need.

Examining resistance is a life long self-care action. You are meant to progress not stand still.

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Thank you for your response. ✨

May14

Abandonment

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Here’s a list of what abandonment is from Susan Anderson’s book “The Journey from Abandonment to Healing” Pages 5 and 6. Susan Anderson has a blog with tons of information on the serious subject of “Abandonment”.

What is abandonment?

A feeling

A feeling of isolation within a relationship

An intense feeling of devastation when a relationship ends.

A primal fear – the raw element that makes going through heartbreak, divorce, separation or bereavement cut so deep

An aloneness not by choice

An experience from childhood

A baby left on a doorstep

A divorce

A woman left by her husband of twenty years for another woman

A man being left by his fiancée for some “more successful”

A mother leaving her children

A father leaving his children

A friend feeling deserted by a friend

A child whose pet dies

A little girl grieving over the death of her mother

A little boy wanting his mommy to come pick him up from nursery school

A child who feels replaced by the birth of another sibling

A child feeling restless because of his parents emotional unavailability

A boy realizing that he is gay and anticipating the reaction of his parents

A teenager feeling that her heart is actually broken

A teenage boy afraid to approach the girl he loves

A woman who has raised now grown children feeling empty as if she has been deserted

A child stricken with a serious illness watching his friends play while he must use a wheelchair or remain in bed

A woman who has lost her job and with it her professional identity, financial security and status

A man who has been put out to pasture by his company as if he is obsolete

A dying woman who fears being abandoned by loved one as much as or more that she fears pain and death

Abandonment is all of this and more. It’s wound is at the heart of human experience.

*******************************************************************************************************************

You could add to the list but I think you get the message, the important thing here is to name what the feeling is.

Abandonment is so very painful, it is a feeling we have all experienced at one time or another. There is a PTSD component to abandonment which leaves it victims with shame, low self-esteem, and fear just to name a few of abandonment influences.

There is hope for survival and recovery, it will not be easy, you will have to do the important work of reaching deep within yourself and uncover the pain that is just below the surface of your awareness. Most of the time this work is not done alone. Counseling, or writing or exercising, read books on the subject, mindfulness and finding some way of getting to  the trauma that abandonment left behind.

You have to help yourself just enough to lift you. You are worth the effort. Don’t give up.

May11

Signs of a Bad Therapist or Counseling

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From Goodtherapy.org

https://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/warning-signs-of-bad-therapy/

  1. Counselor does not have sufficient and specific training to address your issues and/or attempts to treat problems outside the scope of the practice.
  2. Therapist is not interested in the changes you want to make and your goals for therapy.
  3. Counselor cannot or does not clearly define how they can help you to solve whatever issue or concern has brought you to therapy.
  4. Therapist provides no explanation of how you will know when your therapy is complete.
  5. Counselor does not seek consultation with other therapists.
  6. Therapist makes guarantees and/or promises.
  7. Therapist has unresolved complaints filed with a licensing board.
  8. Therapist does not provide you with information about your rights as a client, confidentiality, office policies, and fees so you can fairly consent to your treatment. Note: The requirement for information provided to new clients by therapists differs by state and licensure requirements.
  9. Counselor is judgmental or critical of your behavior, lifestyle, or problems.
  10. Therapist “looks down” at you or treats you as inferior in subtle or not so subtle ways.
  11. Counselor blames your family, friends, or partner.
  12. Counselor encourages you to blame your family, friends, or partner.
  13. Therapist knowingly or unknowingly gets personal psychological needs met at the expense of focusing on you and your therapy.
  14. Counselor tries to be your friend.
  15. Therapist initiates touch (i.e., hugs) without consent.
  16. Counselor attempts to have a sexual or romantic relationship with you.
  17. Therapist talks excessively about personal issues and/or self-discloses often without any therapeutic purpose.
  18. Counselor tries to enlist your help with something not related to your therapy.
  19. Therapist discloses your identifying information without authorization or mandate.
  20. Counselor tells you the identities of other clients.
  21. Therapist discloses they have never done personal therapy work.
  22. Counselor cannot accept feedback or admit mistakes.
  23. Therapist focuses extensively on diagnosing without also helping you to change.
  24. Counselor talks too much.
  25. Therapist does not talk at all.
  26. Counselor often speaks in complex “psychobabble” that leaves you confused.
  27. Therapist focuses on thoughts and cognition at the exclusion of feelings and somatic experience.
  28. Counselor focuses on feelings and somatic experience at the exclusion of thoughts, insight, and cognitive processing.
  29. Therapist acts as if they have the answers or solutions to everything and spends time telling you how to best fix or change things.
  30. Counselor tells you what to do, makes decisions for you, or gives frequent unsolicited advice.
  31. Therapist encourages your dependency by allowing you to get your emotional needs met from the therapist. Therapist “feeds you fish, rather than helping you to fish for yourself.”

  32. Counselor tries to keep you in therapy against your will.

  33. Therapist believes that only the therapist’s counseling approach works and ridicules other approaches to therapy.
  34. Therapist is contentious with you or frequently confrontational.
  35. Counselor doesn’t remember your name and/or doesn’t remember your interactions from one session to the next.
  36. Therapist does not pay attention or appear to be listening and understanding you.
  37. Counselor answers the phone during your session.
  38. Therapist is not sensitive to your culture or religion.
  39. Counselor denies or ignores the importance of your spirituality.
  40. Therapist tries to push spirituality or religion on to you.
  41. Counselor does not empathize.
  42. Therapist empathizes too much.
  43. Counselor seems overwhelmed with your problems.
  44. Therapist seems overly emotional, affected, or triggered by your feelings or issues.
  45. Counselor pushes you into highly vulnerable feelings or memories against your wishes.
  46. Therapist avoids exploring any of your emotional or vulnerable feelings.
  47. Counselor does not ask your permission to use various psychotherapeutic techniques.
  48. Therapist tries to get you to exert overt control over your impulses, compulsions, or addictions without helping you to appreciate and resolve the underlying causes.
  49. Counselor prematurely and/or exclusively focuses on helping you to appreciate and resolve the underlying causes of an issue or compulsion when you would instead benefit more from learning coping skills to manage your impulses.
  50. Your counselor habitually misses, cancels, or shows up late to appointments.
May2

A Healthy Lifestyle for Good Mental Health

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This information is from MentalhealthAmerica.net, take a moment and read up on how to help your mental health and the mental health of others.

Mental Health Month 2018 – Toolkit Download

Full Toolkit

Full Toolkit (PDF 39.4 MB)

Full Toolkit Zip (zip file – images included)

Mental health is essential to everyone’s overall health and well-being, and mental illnesses are common and
treatable. So much of what we do physically impacts us mentally –it’s important to pay attention to both your
physical health and your mental health, which can help you achieve overall wellness and set you on a path to
recovery.
This May is Mental Health Month; purelysimplewords.com  is raising awareness about the connection between
physical health and mental health, through the theme Fitness #4Mind4Body. The campaign is meant to educate and
inform individuals about how eating healthy foods, gut health, managing stress, exercising, and getting enough
sleep can go a long way in making you healthy all around.
A healthy lifestyle can help to prevent the onset or worsening of mental health conditions like depression and
anxiety, as well as heart disease, diabetes, obesity and other chronic health problems. It can also play a big role
in helping people recover from these conditions. Taking good care of your body is part of a before Stage Four
approach to mental health.
Getting the appropriate amount of exercise can help control weight, improve mental health, and help you live
longer and healthier. Recent research is also connecting your nutrition and gut health with your mental health.
Sleep also plays a critical role in all aspects of our life and overall health. Getting a good night’s sleep is important
to having enough physical and mental energy to take on daily responsibilities. And we all know that stress can
have a huge impact on all aspects of our health, so it’s important to take time to focus on stress-reducing activities
like meditation or yoga.
purelysimplewords.com wants everyone to know that mental illnesses are real, and recovery is always the goal. Living a
healthy lifestyle may not be easy, but by looking at your overall health every day – both physically and mentally –
you can go a long way in ensuring that you focus on your Fitness #4Mind4Body.

For more information, visit http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/may.

Fact Sheets/ Poster

Fitness 4Mind4Body: FACT SHEET Diet and Nutrition (PDF)

Fitness 4Mind4Body: FACT SHEET Exercise (PDF)

Fitness 4Mind4Body: FACT SHEET Gut Brain Connection (PDF)

Fitness 4Mind4Body: FACT SHEET Sleep (PDF)

Fitness 4Mind4Body: FACT SHEET Stress (PDF)

Fitness 4Mind4Body: POSTER Take the Challenge (PDF) Meant to be printed 11 x 17 paper

Worksheets

When Changing Diet is Hard (PDF)

When Changing Exercise is Hard (PDF)

When Changing Sleep is Hard (PDF)

When Managing Stress is Hard (PDF)

Social Media Materials

Sample Social Media Posts (PDF)

Images (To download, right- click the image and select “Save Image As.”)

Challenge Call to Action (PNG 250 x 250 px)

Screening Call to Action Button (PNG 250 x 250 px)

Facebook Profile Picture (PNG 180 x 180 px)

Facebook Cover (PNG 820 x 312 px)

Facebook Shareable (PNG 1200 x 630 px)

Twitter Profile (PNG 400 x 400 px)

Twitter Header (PNG 1500 x 500 px)

Twitter Shareable (PNG 442 x 220 px)

Instagram Profile Picture (PNG 110 x 110 px)

Instagram Shareable (PNG 1080 x 1080 px)


Horizontal Banner (PNG 468 x 100 px)

Vertical Banner (PNG 100 x 468 px)

 

Oct26

Thoughtful Thursdays #184 – Inner World – Outer World

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We all have an inner and outer world. In our head there are so many thoughts and voices it’s hard to identify which way is the most effective way.

We all have an outer world that reflects your inner world. The mess, confusion, the paralysis.

How to get the both in sync is to find your way of grounding yourself.

To start: In whatever task you are doing direct your thoughts to the present moment.

For example: I am washing the dishes, I am cutting an onion, I am driving my car, I am walking the dog. Bring attention to your breathing. Let the thoughts come with no judgement. Don’t judge yourself either.

The idea is to get out of your head for a little while and find a sense of peace away from racing thoughts and impulsive actions.

Your inner world and outer world will thank you for the peace.

Sep28

Thoughtful Thursdays #181 – Generosity

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I am not talking about being generous with  huge donations of time and money and goods. I am talking about generosity with the small things that are so meaningful.

Listening with full attention, giving a supportive hug, saying kind and reassuring words, giving of your labor, making time for someone who needs you, holding a door, spend the day being courteous to everyone, in the face of conflict or differing opinions stay calm and don’t react, finding in your heart to do no harm with your words or actions.

These are just a few incognito generous actions you can take. You will end up helping someone else and feeling so much more accomplished as a human being.

Carry on you lovely generous being.

 

Aug24

Thoughtful Thursdays #176 – Internalized Oppression

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Internalized oppression is when we  have been oppressed and unwittingly use the methods of the oppressor against ourselves. The oppressor could be family of origin, your unfulfilling job, negative friends, or any other area that feels oppressive. Wow that is a heavy realization.

How do we recognize this internalized oppression?

  1. Where am I punishing myself. Am I continuing a behavior that is keeping me down.
  2. Are my beliefs based on an oppressors opinion?
  3. Do I want to assimilate or  fit in with my oppressors to feel of value?
  4. Do you have oppressive views of your identity?
  5. Do you believe you have no power?

Here are some remedies. I am sure there are many more.

  1. Stop a negative behavior and sit with the feeling. There’s a good chance there is shame and guilt present. Express any feelings that come up.
  2. You now have permission to have your own opinions and don’t need any validation but your own.
  3. You are not supposed to fit in, you are supposed to be your own person without apologies.
  4. Your identity is your own, no one can tell you who you are.
  5. Power can be overwhelming, take baby steps in reclaiming your personal power.

We learn to oppress ourselves, and it can be unlearned. This is the work of an empowered adult.

So get to work, you are worth it.

 

Aug17

Thoughtful Thursdays #175 – What Is Necessary to Our Wellbeing

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There are three things necessary to our wellbeing: Identity, Community and Purpose.

However in our fractured world where these things are hard to find, many people, young people especially are lost in the world. The internet doesn’t help. Even though the internet is a tremendous asset there is not much in the way of human interaction. So we become fractured. We lose any sense of identity, community and purpose. We flip from one relationship to another to find our identity, racing from one community to another to feel we fit in, and trying over and over again different causes to feel personally satisfied. Or we can completely shut down.

We can see the lies fed to everyone by invisible agenda makers. These invisible agenda makers know psychology to manipulate those who are searching for their lost identity, community and purpose. Their hidden agenda is to tap into these basic human needs to the detriment of the searcher. These invisible agenda makers come up as extremists groups as political, religious, consumerism and that sneaky minority of those who just hate humanity and are power-hungry to destroy anyone they can.

Let’s find out what our true identity, community and purpose is by not blindly following others but doing the work of learning about ourselves. If you have no sense of identity, find out who you are by your own standards. If you have no community, find like-minded people or create your own community. If you have no sense of purpose, find your passion and go for it.

It’s not easy to go your own way, it’s unknown territory so at times you will feel lonely and lost. That is OK. Sit with the feeling rather than running away from it. When you arrive to the other side you will know more of who you are, have an internal compass that will find the community that loves you and you get up every day happy to live your purpose.

Stop wasting time, learn more about you now.