Out of Overwhelm: Discovering Self-Regulation, Discovering Self-Love
“I’m feeling so stressed out these days! What can I do to help myself? What have you done when you were struggling?”
These questions come my way, in varied forms, almost every day, especially these days. While most of my blog pieces share the intricacies of my own journey – belief systems, trauma and conditioning – this blog piece is going to be more about tools and practices that helped me get from there to here. I hope that some of what I share here will support and empower those who are looking to increase their level of well-being and build a loving relationship with their self, even when life is challenging.
What if?
A client was exploring their need to seek out solutions – to constantly go to their thoughts (or self-destructive actions) every time life felt hard. To my client, it felt very much like they were either living “in their head” or trying to escape from the thoughts in their head. They lived a life of varied compulsions and endless seeking. And while they were successful by culture’s standards, they were dissatisfied with their life, and often depressed.
As we worked together, something started to change in how they met life. The compulsive need to “go mental” shifted as, over time, they learned that they could bring attention into their body and feel, instead of automatically turning to escape habits or thought strategies. It was slowly becoming their reality that being in their body was a far safer place to be than trapped in their “hamster-wheel mind“ looking for solutions to problems that thoughts would never be able to solve.
“What if, as a child, I was taught or guided to feel, instead of immediately look for solutions”, they pondered. “What if I had learned to spend even just a moment on feeling before jumping into looking for possible solutions or engaging in harmful actions?”
They had been discovering first hand that there were feelings under all the “hamster-wheel thoughts” that simply wanted to be felt. These feeling had always seemed like “too much” but with practice and guidance, were actually quite safe to be with. They had just needed to experientially learn that their body was indeed safe to feel. This opened up the world to them, and shifted their perspective with themself. What had been sentiments of self-loathing and shame slowly transformed into feelings of compassion and acceptance.
It gets complicated, real fast
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- When we don’t know how to be with what we’re experiencing and feeling, we don’t know how to value it.
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- If we don’t have worth with what we’re experiencing and feeling, we can’t value or find worth in ourselves.
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- When we can’t value ourselves, we can’t love ourselves.
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- The area of the feet
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- The fingers or hands
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- The arm pits
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- The pelvic floor
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- The rhythmic movement of the breath
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- The buttocks on the chair
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- Receiving of sound
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- The tongue lying in the mouth
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- Air moving through the nostrils
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- Air on the skin
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- Heat: hot beverages, baths, showers, water bottles, etc are very fondly received by my nervous system. Your nervous system may appreciate cold temperatures, or a mixture of hot and cold. Honor your uniqueness.
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- Walks outside
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- Listening and watching birds and squirrels from inside my house
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- Listening to music, depending on my mood
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- Smelling certain scents, either through flowers, candles or essential oils
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- Playing with animals at the animal shelter
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- playing with my cats
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- Watching TV shows that touch my heart or make me laugh
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- Journaling
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- Taking supplements and eating food which support my nervous system
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- Sleep and/or naps and/or lying down
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- Being mindful of my electronic use
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- Reading – different kinds of genres depending on my needs of the moment
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- Speaking or connecting with friends or support systems.
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- Exercise of some kind
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- After reading this sentence, let your eyes gently close, feel your body in the chair (or wherever you are situated), take a breath, and take a moment to notice what is going on in your direct experience right this very moment.
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- How is it to be sitting in this chair? Said another way, what is being experienced as I’m sitting in this chair?
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- Start slow, gentle and curious.
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- Ask questions into your “now experience” that include aspects of your body’s experience. (See the chair example above)
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- Steer your attention towards simple, easy and safe
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- Keep returning to simple, over and over.
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- Play and practice for short periods of time at first.
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- What am I seeing?
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- What am I thinking?
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- What am I smelling
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- What am I touching
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- What am I feeling
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- What energies or visceral sensations are present?
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- Am I judging myself?
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- What is it like when I judge myself?
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- Can I allow the judging, but also gently bring some attention to something simple that is here? Be open to the answer being yes or no, or maybe some yes and some no.
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- Can I curiously rest in that which is simple? Be open to the answer being being yes or no, or maybe some yes and some no.
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- Is it time to stop inquiring and do something else?