Dealing with the Dark Side of Family Time

two young women standing next to each other.

Dealing With the Dark Side of Family Time 

 

The late spiritual teacher Ram Dass once offered the sage advice, “If you think you’re enlightened, go spend a week with your family.” I often find myself echoing some version of these words in my conversations with clients who, feeling like they’ve made considerable progress in their personal development, find themselves frustrated after spending time with family. They tell me that things they thought they had resolved suddenly resurfaced in the presence of family members. Without warning, the grounded and responsive version of themselves they worked so hard to become was quickly replaced with an emotionally reactive and easily triggered version they thought they’d left behind. The first thing I do when clients share with me the disappointing encounters they’ve had around their families is to remind them that this is totally normal. Just as Ram Dass’s words suggest, no matter how far any of us believes we’ve gotten along the path of personal growth or spiritual enlightenment, time with family is bound to put our tools, our skills, and our insights to the ultimate test. This might seem counterintuitive. Why is it easier to be your best and highest self around strangers and acquaintances than it is around the people you’ve known all your life? It’s natural to find this confusing; but perhaps it shouldn’t come as such a surprise. After all, your family of origin—or, in other words, the family you were born into—is the environment in which you were shaped and molded. It’s where you first developed a sense of yourself and a way of seeing the world. The family environment is an emotionally charged environment that has its own energetic force field. When you return to that environment after becoming your own individual self, you reenter that force field. The effects of this differ from person to person, but they can include:  

 

  • Irritability or agitation 
  • A feeling of being easily triggered or set off 
  • Physical symptoms of anxiety (e.g., rapid heartrate, clamminess, dizziness)
  • Fatigue
  • Regression to a less mature, more childlike version of yourself 
  • Difficulty speaking up or stating an opinion
  • Heightened sensitivity or sense of insecurity 
  • An unconscious resuming of old roles once played in the family 
  • Brain fog and difficulty concentrating 

 

If you suffered childhood trauma or were subject to abuse in your family home, returning to the family environment can be especially destabilizing. When that’s the case, it’s important to develop a self-care plan and clear set of boundaries to help you keep the experience as emotionally safe as possible. Working with a therapist or survivor support group is a great way to develop these tools so that, if you do find yourself around family for planned or unexpected reasons, you can take care of yourself through the process. Regardless of your history or the nature of your relationships with family members, you’re likely to feel some effects from returning to a family environment as an independent adult. You might feel certain emotions come up, or notice a less preferred side of you coming out. When this happens, avoid the temptation to beat yourself up, and try to observe what’s happening with tender curiosity. Allow yourself to be a little less enlightened than you thought you were, and aim to approach the experience with mindful awareness. Practice breathing a little deeper, talking to yourself a little more kindly, and seeing your family landscape through a different lens. Use the tools you’ve been reading in books and talking about in therapy. Though you might come away from the encounter realizing there’s more work for you to do on yourself (not such a bad thing, in my eyes!), you might also find yourself with new understandings of yourself and your family that can help you grow, heal, and expand.  

What a Trip!

a wooden table topped with lots of plates and bowls.

I haven’t written in a while, but I’ve certainly had some things in mind to share; and I’m grateful to have that opportunity now. As some of you know, I spent a couple of weeks away this month on a visit to Morocco and Spain. It was my first time in Morocco, and though it was a wedding in Marrakech that brought me there, I got a chance to experience a few other parts of the country and enjoy some of the many riches it has to offer. I had few expectations going into the trip; and I’m glad for that, because nothing could have prepared me for the journey it turned out to be. While I was there, and since coming home, I’ve done a lot of reflecting on what I experienced and what all of it had to teach me.

From the moment my flight touched down in Marrakech, I was overcome by the energy of this new place. My senses were overloaded, and it took effort to stay centered. There was so much to take in, so many things around me demanding my attention, something unexpected at every turn. I felt completely scattered, yet totally present. Time flew by while somehow seeming to drag on forever. It was a dizzying experience that, oddly enough, led me to feel more grounded than ever.

Getting immersed in a new place requires a certain degree of surrender, a releasing of patterned ways of thinking and being. But the truth is, we don’t need to stamp our passports to get this experience. We always have this choice—to let go of what isn’t serving us and live into new possibilities; to shed old skin and grow into something new. For me, this trip was a humbling reminder of how much there is in this world, this Life, to be discovered. When we allow ourselves to move outside our context, our culture, our comfort zones, our customary ways of being in the world, we get rewarded and expanded. We move a little closer to the essence of Life, catching a glimpse of its vastness through the small pieces of it we get to savor. It’s a choice we get to make every day—stay small, or expand; close ourselves off, or open ourselves up with curiosity. Remembering that we have this choice isn’t always easy, and sometimes we have to shake things up to realize it again. But when we do, we get to grow.

One of the biggest treasures of this experience was the sense of connection I felt with the people I met in Morocco. Through the brief but significant encounters I had with them, I got reminded of how transcendent human connection can be. We have the ability to communicate with people in powerful ways that go far beyond the words we speak. This awareness came most penetratingly to me through an encounter with a practical stranger that I doubt I’ll ever forget. We didn’t share a language—save for a few words of Arabic and English that both of us could understand—but, in our brief exchange, I experienced trust, understanding, acceptance, forgiveness, and love. We connected and communicated in a way that transcended language, culture, or any other seeming differences between us. It served as a reminder and affirmation that true connection isn’t about the surface stuff. It’s about presence, awareness, attunement, patience, and a mutual willingness to understand. To really connect, we’ve got to slow down and pay attention. We’ve got to hold ourselves in the space to give and receive. Our connections with each other open us up to new worlds; they reveal new insights and understandings; they help us resolve our differences and discover our sameness; they affirm that we’re all having this curious and wondrous human experience together.

For me, this trip was a teacher. It humbled me, expanded me, and got me present to some things I believe wholeheartedly—that new experience is a transformative tool, and human connections are powerful medicine. After two weeks of traveling, I was eager to return home; but I promised myself that I’d hold on to all the lessons I learned while I was away. And now I get to share them with you. Thank you for being the space to receive them. I hope they resonate with a part of you and, in some way, contribute to your own beautiful journey.

Manifestation: The Real Deal

a man riding a zip line in the middle of a forest.

There’s a lot of talk these days, especially in spiritual circles, about manifestation. And that’s a beautiful thing. It means—on some level, at least— that people are becoming aware of how our thoughts, beliefs, and general mindset influence our experience. That’s essentially what the concept of manifestation is all about: focusing on what you desire, and attracting it through what you think, say, and do. Here’s the thing, though. That last part, the do part, is the most important element of the manifestation process—and it’s the one that tends to be emphasized the least.

Many discussions about manifestation make it appear as though you simply have to think positive thoughts, and all of your deepest desires will be fulfilled. But this is a narrow view of the concept. First, it implicitly suggests that what happens to us in life is exclusively a matter of choice; by extension, then, people who suffer great misfortunes—like those born into poverty, those with terrible diseases, or those subjected to violence, for example—somehow brought it upon themselves through negative thinking or a lack of intention. This is faulty and problematic reasoning, of course; things simply don’t work that way. However, though we can’t determine everything that happens to us in life, most of us, no matter our circumstances, have the creative capacity to bring about changes based on what we choose to think and believe. There are countless examples of people who, even in the most wretched of conditions, chose to interpret their circumstances in positive and uplifting ways, and subsequently moved their lives onto a more promising path. Dr. Viktor Frankl, who lost his wife, parents, and other family members in the Holocaust, is one such example. His famous book, Man’s Search for Meaning, offers an inspiring testimony to the power of the mind, the endurance of the human spirit, and the true nature of manifestation.

There’s another major challenge with misinterpreting manifestation as simply a matter of closing your eyes, wishing for what you want, and opening them again to find it there in front of you. As I mentioned earlier, many conversations about manifestation heavily emphasize the thinking and feeling aspects and barely mention the doing. But it’s in the doing that the real magic of manifestation exists.

Any of us can easily conjure thoughts and fantasies about what we desire. For some of us it’s a hefty pay raise, a dream job, or a fancy house; for others it’s the ideal romantic partner or a picture-perfect family. Whatever the dream entails, the dreaming part is easy. And if we think of manifestation as simply dreaming the dream and waiting for it to materialize, we’re bound to be disappointed. But this doesn’t mean we need to throw the proverbial baby out with the bathwater. Instead, we should guide our attention to the most significant aspect of manifestation, the one with the greatest likelihood of turning our dreams into reality: committed action.

Many successful people will tell you they’ve gotten to where they have by dreaming big, keeping that dream alive for themselves, and doing whatever it takes to get there. Their path to success offers the rest of us a step-by-step guide to manifestation. Step 1: Create a vision; Step 2: Keep your mind filled with positive thoughts related to that vision, imagining it as if it’s already come true; Step 3: Do everything possible to achieve what you desire; Step 4: Watch your vision become reality. Put this way, manifestation isn’t such a far-out, new-age concept. It’s not nearly as glamorous or easy to sell, but it’s much more likely to yield results.

Once you start getting the step-by-step of manifestation down, you’re likely to notice that things you desire start showing up in your life. You’ve set your mind to the right frequency and taken committed action accordingly: Why wouldn’t you get what you want? But here’s where you’ve got to be extra careful. Remember the saying, “Be careful what you wish for; you just might get it”? Well, it rings with real truth when it comes to manifestation. Because, you see, it’s one thing to want something we don’t yet have, and quite another to receive and hold onto that something. I’ve worked with more than a few people who learned everything they could about manifestation in order to attract the perfect partner, only to find that when that person actually did appear in their lives, they didn’t know what to do next.

One of my former clients spent years envisioning the man she believed would give her the happily-ever-after she’d always wanted. During a casual night out with friends, when she didn’t expect to meet anyone at all, she came face-to-face with a guy who seemed to be everything she’d been calling forth through her manifestation efforts. But a month or two into dating him, my client felt completely defeated. What she came to realize was that her attempts at manifesting the ideal partner were completely outwardly focused. She was so caught up in dreaming up what the other person would be like that she didn’t once stop to consider who she would want or need to be in order to maintain a healthy and harmonious relationship with that person. She was intent on manifesting a “responsible guy who’s focused on his career and his future;” but once she started dating him, she realized she hadn’t given much thought to what it would actually be like to have such a partner. His strict weekly routine of work, workouts, and early nights clashed with her happy hour circuit with girlfriends, and his future-focused attitude didn’t really jibe with her tendency to live in the moment and worry about the details later. In short, she asked for more than she was ready to receive, and rather than getting to enjoy what she had manifested, she wound up feeling as though she was “self-sabotaging” it.

I know my clients aren’t the only ones who have discovered that manifestation comes with some strings attached. In my own life, I’ve had to do my fair share of recalibrating when the things I was so focused on manifesting finally appeared. It all serves as a healthy and important reminder that life isn’t perfect, and that if we dare to ask for certain things to come our way, we’ve got to be ready to receive them. I, for one, continue to believe wholeheartedly in our collective creative capacity and the power we have to manifest our deepest desires. So, let’s keep dreaming big and weaving those dreams into reality. And while we’re on that journey of aligning our intentions, thoughts, emotions, and actions to bring forth what we’re seeking, let’s aim to keep it all in healthy perspective.

Communicate More Mindfully

two people sitting on a bench in front of a cage.

You probably don’t need me to tell you that mindfulness practice offers a broad array of benefits for the willing and dedicated practitioner. When we open ourselves to this practice, we create the potential for our lives to be transformed in ways that might seem subtle, but truly make a world of difference. Though many of the benefits of mindfulness are personal and internal—improved concentration, expanded sense of awareness, increased patience, and enduring states of tranquility, to name a few—some important aspects of the practice can positively affect our external experience as well. Take communication, for example. Using mindfulness in our communication with others can improve our relationships and help us navigate even the most difficult conversations.

If you already have a practice of cultivating mindfulness, a little intention is all you’ll need to start applying it to your communication. If you haven’t yet developed a practice of mindfulness, that’s a good place to start. In case the concept isn’t clear, mindfulness is essentially a practice of paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, with a spirit of awareness, acceptance, and nonjudgment. Mindfulness can be cultivated through formal meditation practice, or on its own throughout the course of your day. By focusing your attention on what you’re experiencing in the moment, and letting thoughts drift into and out of your awareness instead of pulling you away, you start to flex a mental muscle that can help you create radical transformations in your life.

When it comes to communication, there are five simple steps you can follow to bring about more mindfulness and match the words you say with the meaning you want to convey.

1. Set a Clear Commitment. When we communicate with others—especially if that communication includes differences of opinion or requires some vulnerability—it can be easy to lose sight of our intention. That’s why it’s so important to make a clear commitment to yourself that can anchor your attention and help you stay focused as you navigate the conversation. Ask yourself, “What am I committed to creating in this conversation?” Then, whatever your response is—“connection,” “clarity,” “understanding,” etc.—make sure your words are aligned with that particular commitment.

2.  Choose Your Words Carefully. It’s easy to get so caught up in our desire to be heard that we lose sight of what we really want to say. Talking mindlessly in this way can steer us away from what we truly want to express, or cause others to tune us out. Intention, one of the cornerstones of mindfulness, goes a long way when we’re communicating. Once you’re clear about the message you want to get across, use great care to choose words that directly convey that message—no more, no less. Mahatma Gandhi is known for saying, “Speak only if it improves upon the silence.” This is a helpful reminder to keep your message straight and to the point. Say what you mean, mean what you say, and don’t be afraid of silence. Sometimes those pauses are exactly what the other person needs to process what you’ve said and respond mindfully in return.

3. Listen With All You’ve Got. No matter how eloquent we might be, our ability to communicate is only as good as our ability to listen. It’s in the listening, in fact, that mindfulness becomes most meaningful and impactful. Often, when someone’s speaking to us, we drift into our minds and start preparing our response. But there’s no way we can be fully present to what’s being said to us if we’re busy thinking about what we’ll say next. Treat the act of listening as a true mindfulness practice. Allow your attention to rest completely on the words being said to you; and any time your thoughts threaten to pull you away, gently return to the act of listening and center your awareness there again.

4. Let Connection Be Your Guide. Communication is about much more than the words being exchanged between two or more people; it includes body language, tone of voice, timing, and much more. Keeping this in mind can help us bring all of our presence and awareness to our conversations, enabling us to communicate clearly and be grounded, graceful recipients of what others communicate to us. As you engage in the act of communication, practice attuning yourself to the other person. Eliminate distractions, and allow yourself to fully connect. Doing this will help you respond more effectively to what’s really being expressed.

5. Don’t Forget to Breathe! In our mindfulness practice, our breath is one of our most powerful tools. It helps us get out of our heads and into our experience; it moves us past impulsivity into intentionality. When you communicate with others, make it a point to connect with your breath, and use it as a way to support you in carrying out the previous four steps. You’ll be amazed at how much more grounded and clear minded you can be on the other side of just one deep, intentional breath.

 

 

Ask a Therapist: How Do I Mend a Broken Relationship?

a close up of two people holding hands.

In this edition of Ask a Therapist, I’m addressing a question I get asked pretty often: How do I mend a broken relationship? Of course, every relationship and circumstance is different; but there are some general considerations that can support the repair process. Whether you’re looking to re-open lines of communication with someone, re-establish trust with your significant other, or mend the rifts in a meaningful relationship, here are a few things to keep in mind.

1) Spend some time reflecting about what happened. This is a crucial step in the repair process, because it’s important to get clear about what happened and how you contributed to it. In the heat of the moment, it can be hard to comprehend what’s happening; and in the aftermath, it’s easy to focus on your hurt feelings and what the other person did to cause them. Before you make any effort to repair the relationship, give some thought to what took place, and see the part you played in it. Look also at how you interpreted the situation, what hurt you most about what happened, what you would have wanted to play out differently, and what you could have done differently to create that outcome. Having a clear, centered, and non-blaming perspective will support you greatly in your repair efforts.

2) Give some thought to what you really want from the relationship. It’s uncomfortable, and often painful, to be at odds with someone you care about; but before you rush to make things better, reflect on your intentions. Be clear and honest with yourself about whether and why you want the other person in your life. And here’s a really important part: be sure you want to move forward with this person as he or she actually is, not as you would prefer for him or her to be. This step is all about being honest with yourself and, in some cases, being willing to consider that the relationship may not be worth salvaging. Skipping this step could lead to resentments down the road, so take your time with it. Think carefully about what the relationship means to you and what role you can see it playing in your life moving forward

3) Approach the initial conversation with sincere openness. If you’ve completed the first two steps and still want to move forward in the repair process, the next step is reaching out and inviting the other person into a conversation. Let him or her know that you’ve been reflecting on the relationship and the way things occurred between you, and you’d like to work on repairing it. Understand that he or she might not be ready or willing to talk. And that’s okay. The time may not be right now, but that doesn’t mean repair will never happen. Give it time, have faith, and be open to the possibility of the conversation happening in the future.

4) Communicate mindfully. If you reach out to the other person and he or she is willing to talk, prepare to approach the conversation mindfully. Make sure you’re focused and centered, attending to your breath and staying present and connected throughout the dialogue. Be willing to see things from another perspective, and listen to the other person without defending yourself. When it’s your turn to speak, focus on your experience without placing blame on the other person. Be honest and open, keeping in mind—especially during the more difficult parts of the conversation—that your primary intention is to reconnect, repair, and move forward.

5) Establish boundaries as needed. Sometimes it’s important to have a conversation about boundaries before moving forward in a relationship. This can be a difficult subject to broach, but it’s important to do it so that similar transgressions don’t occur in the future. If your personal boundaries were violated in the relationship, be sure to speak up about it and clearly express what you need moving forward. This is a challenging but crucial step in the process, as it involves truly working on repair instead of simply glossing over what happened and rushing to make things right again. Be willing to speak up, but remember not to reject your understanding and compassion in order to do it!

6) Give yourself credit, and be grateful. Nobody’s perfect, and no relationship is perfect either. Open communication, mutual respect, compassionate understanding, and willingness to forgive are all part of the process—and that process isn’t easy! So give yourself credit for doing the work; and give the other person credit, too. Express gratitude for him or her, and acknowledge your mutual decision to heal and grow together. This is a beautiful way to honor the repair process and build on your relationship, offering it the potential to grow stronger and more fulfilling for both of you.

If It Isn’t Yours, Don’t Take It

a purple flower with rain falling down on it.

You know that person at the office who’s always sick with whatever bug is going around and chooses to go to work anyway? No matter how hard you try to avoid making contact, you somehow always end up catching whatever he or she’s got. It’s unnerving, uncomfortable, and seemingly unavoidable. Unpleasant though it may be, it’s the nature of office culture and contagious illness: if someone catches something, everyone else is likely to catch it also.

But the common cold isn’t the only thing that gets spread this way. Emotions, moods, and attitudes are just as contagious. Whether it’s a negative person in the workplace or a family member who’s perpetually on edge, there’s always going to be someone whose energy can contaminate you—that is, until you learn to immunize yourself from it.

Years ago, one of my mentors shared something with me that forever changed the way I conduct therapy and relate to other people in my life. We were having a discussion about one of my clients and the particularly challenging family issue she was working through in our sessions together. Week after week, this client arrived to our sessions distraught, anxious, and desperate for things to be different. The 60 minutes we’d spend together every week—during which she’d spend most of the time complaining, and I’d spend most of the time shrinking into my chair—felt like torture for me; by the time each session ended, I’d be worked up and bent out of shape. Noticing this, my mentor said the following to me: “If you absorb the emotional energy she’s emitting, you’ll be in no position to support her. You have to keep your emotional and energetic space clear if you’re going to have a shot at helping her clear hers.” “That makes sense,” I told him. But how do I do that?” “It’s simple,” he answered. “Whenever you’re in her presence—or in the presence of anyone whose emotions are affecting you—ask yourself this question: Whose emotion is this?” Time stopped the moment I heard those words. The question struck me as so powerful, so profound in its simplicity, that I had to pause for a moment and center myself. What this question has yielded for me and the clients I’ve shared it with over the years has made all the difference in the world.

You see, human beings are wired for connection, and certain cells in our brains—known as mirror neurons—cause us to automatically react to other people’s emotions. It’s the reason we instinctively cringe when we see someone get injured; it’s why we cry when the protagonist in a film experiences something painful. We can’t help but be affected by each other; we’re contagious in this way. So it can sometimes be difficult to distinguish other people’s emotions from our own. But, thankfully, we have the ability to choose how much we want to be affected by the emotions we come in contact with in the course of our relationships with others. The more skillfully we can do this, the less susceptible we are to getting weighed down by other people’s emotional baggage.

Here are some tips for developing that skill:

  1. Practice mindfulness. The more grounded and centered you are in your own experience, the easier it will be for you to distinguish your emotions from those of other people. Practice checking in with yourself on a regular basis, noticing what you’re thinking, feeling, observing, and experiencing in the moment. The more familiar you get with what’s going on inside you, the more quickly you’ll notice when you’ve absorbed someone else’s stuff.
  1. Set clear boundaries. It’s possible to have empathy for people without burdening yourself with their emotions. This requires setting firm boundaries and maintaining a clear sense of where others end and you begin. Sometimes, of course, that’s much easier said than done. No doubt, some people will challenge your ability to keep your emotional space clear, but it’s your responsibility to keep the boundaries in place. If you notice yourself getting worked up on a phone call with a perpetually pissed off relative, it’s okay to lovingly end the call. If the coworker you have lunch with always spends the time complaining, and you find yourself returning to the office in a bad mood, it’s okay to tell her you won’t be joining her for a few days. Caring about others and being supportive doesn’t require you to take on their emotions. The clearer your boundaries are, the clearer that distinction will be.
  1. Practice the catch and release method. Sometimes it’s impossible to avoid catching emotions that didn’t originate from you. But the quicker you notice that it’s happened, the quicker you can do something about it. Whenever you see that you’ve been affected by another person’s energy/mood/vibe, inhale deeply, say to yourself, “I’ve picked up something that doesn’t belong to me,” and on the exhale, focus your attention on releasing it. The more regularly you do this, the better you’ll become at it. Before you know it, you’ll be letting other people’s emotional energy pass right through you without it getting stuck, and you’ll be in a much better position to stay in connection with them without being negatively affected.
  1. Make your emotional health a priority. When you commit to being emotionally well, you build your immunity from other people’s emotional junk. So make your wellbeing a priority. Take care of yourself, manage your stress level, keep company with people who make you feel good. The healthier you are, emotionally speaking, the less likely you’ll be to absorb other people’s emotions.

Vitamin C, rest, physical exercise, and a healthy diet will help you maintain your body’s immune system. To keep your emotional immune system healthy, mindfulness, self-care, and clear boundaries will do the trick. The next time you notice yourself picking up someone else’s emotional baggage, ask yourself “Whose emotion is this?” If the answer isn’t “Mine,” gently set it down. Because if it isn’t yours, why would you take it?

I Can Do Nothing For You

a person holding a bunch of leaves in their hands.

In one of the first classes I took as a graduate student, the professor began her first lecture by saying something along the lines of, “So, you want to be a therapist? Well, let’s start with some ground rules. Rule number one: Never help anyone.” I was flabbergasted. Dumbfounded. For a moment I thought I’d sat down in the wrong class. I wondered how a professor could give such an incomprehensible instruction to a group of students who, by and large, chose their career path so they could help and serve others. I started to rethink everything that influenced my decision to become a therapist.

That professor never directly explained what she meant by her shocking introductory message. Instead, she assured us that through the course of our experiences as students, interns, and professionals, we would come to learn exactly what she was talking about. I’ll admit that it took me some time to understand the meaning behind her injunction to “never help anyone.” During the first couple years of my career, I exhausted myself with efforts to help my clients. I put all my energy into trying to motivate them, heal them, free them from their unfortunate circumstances, inspire them to change. In many cases, I worked harder than my clients at making a difference in their lives, only to find myself disappointed and depleted when things didn’t go according to my plan. I can’t recall the specific moment when my professor’s teaching became clear to me, but once it did, it revolutionized my work and inspired me to pass the wisdom on to others.

What I came to understand is that if I was to truly be of service to my clients, I had to transform my understanding of what it meant to “help” them. All along I had been working from the premise that helping others means doing things for them, taking action on their behalf, grabbing the reins and steering their lives in a particular direction. The truth is, I acted from this definition of help not only in my relationships with clients, but in my relationships with everyone. I always saw myself as a giving and helping person, and I regularly went out of my way to be there for the people in my life, even when it meant inconveniencing myself or taking on more than I could handle.

What I finally realized is that my professor wasn’t telling us to be unavailable for our clients. She wasn’t commanding us to be unhelpful. Instead, she was nudging us toward the understanding that to truly be of service to others, we have to position ourselves in a very particular way. In essence, we have to help them by empowering them to help themselves. That brilliant professor wanted her students to understand that the best thing therapists can do for their clients is keep them company on their journey toward solving their own problems, finding their own way. And now that I understand that, I want everyone I know to understand it as well.

There’s a quote from psychologist, author, and spiritual teacher Ram Dass that I’m totally crazy about. It goes: “I can do nothing for you but work on myself. You can do nothing for me but work on yourself.” The wisdom in that quote is the same wisdom imparted on me by my professor. You see, if you are to be of service to anyone in this world, your primary task is to be stable, centered, and well. It is only when you are well that you can help others be well. Think about it this way: When flight attendants give the safety instructions just before takeoff they remind you that in the case of an emergency, when the oxygen masks drop down, you must put yours on first before helping anyone else with theirs. The logic of this is very simple: If you run out of air, you’ll be in no position to assist anyone around you. Helping others, in that case, won’t be very much help at all. And so it is in every aspect of our lives. If we want to be helpful, we must first be well.

When my professor told us to “never help anyone,” she wasn’t telling us to be unkind. And I’m not telling you to be unkind either. Instead, I’m telling you that the greatest gift you can give to anyone in this world is to be the best version of yourself. First, because your doing so is likely to inspire other people, motivating them to work on themselves. Second, because it is only when you are centered and attending to your own needs that you have the capacity to be available to others. And finally, because helping others doesn’t mean taking over for them; it means being a source of support—someone they can lean on when they need it. If they’re going to lean on you, you’ve got to be sturdy. Your foundation has got to be solid.

Once I was able to shift my way of helping others, I never again felt the fatigue or resentment I was once so susceptible to experiencing. Instead, I felt a vitality that was invigorating for me and inspiring for the people around me. When I started to focus on stabilizing and centering myself, my capacity to support others expanded; at last, I became helpful in the truest sense.

I invite you to begin your own journey of rethinking what it means to be helpful, and I welcome you to consider that the best way to give to others is to first give to yourself.

 

Relationship Problems and How to Fix Them: Tips from an Expert

two people walking down a dirt road in the fog.

This week I want to share with you an article I came across in Time online, which explores the four most common problems couples face, along with some on-target suggestions for how to fix them. I’ll be honest, I usually tend to skeptically raise an eyebrow when I come across articles like this one—but, in this case, I was pleasantly surprised. The author really did his homework. To find out what problems couples most commonly face, he turned to Dr. John Gottman, a premier expert in romantic relationships and a pioneer in couples therapy research. Gottman’s research on the strengths that characterize successful relationships and the pitfalls that characterize the not-so-successful ones has significantly influenced my work with couples. So it seems appropriate that I should share this article with you.

If you’re looking to strengthen your relationship, you’ll certainly find the information in the article to be helpful. But, of course, tips like the ones contained within it are only beneficial if you put them to use. If you believe your relationship could use some fine tuning, couples therapy may be the right choice for you. Contact me for a free consultation! 305-814-4863

Happy reading!

http://time.com/3629761/fix-relationship-problems/?xid=time_socialflow_facebook

 

 

 

Why Children Make Great Role Models

a young boy holding the hand of an older man.

A role model is someone we admire and wish to emulate—someone after whom we want to model our lives in some way. When we choose our role models, we tend to choose people who are older than us or have more life experience. We look to people like our parents; our bosses; or people deemed successful by society’s standards, like world leaders, entrepreneurs, celebrities, or famous athletes. But who says role models have to be people we look up to? What if we could look down, literally speaking, to find some of the best examples for how to live?

The way I see it, children make some of the best role models. Here’s why:

1) They’re unfiltered. Children tend to say exactly what’s on their mind (sometimes to their parents’ great embarrassment). They don’t tend to second-guess themselves or augment what they want to say in order to please others. This kind of unbridled honesty is something we can learn from. When was the last time you bit your tongue and chose to stay silent about something when you wanted to speak up? How often do you find yourself choosing your words so carefully that what you end up saying hardly resembles what you mean? As adults we regularly hold back or manipulate our words in order to satisfy other people, evade conflict, or avoid rejection. We censor ourselves, only to end up suffering the pitfalls of not speaking our truth. Children can teach us a lot about saying what we mean.

2) They’re naturally mindful. Because most experiences are new to children, they tend to approach them with what Zen Buddhists call shoshin, or “beginner’s mind.” They have a natural ability to be fully present in the here-and-now, experiencing everything through their five senses in a state of unadulterated awareness. When you think about how much we struggle to remain grounded in the present moment without getting distracted by the flood of thoughts pulling us into the past or future, it’s easy to see how much we can learn from children on this front. Children can teach us a lot about being present. 

3) They understand the value of play. We’re so consumed by our commitments and responsibilities that many of us forget how to have fun. Most adults in Western society consider leisure a luxury; it ranks low on their list of priorities, if it appears there at all. But the role of play doesn’t need to be diminished as a consequence of getting older. In fact, it’s just as important for adults as it is for children. Engaging in fun, playful activities is a great way to relieve stress, improve brain functioning, fortify relationships, and boost creativity. Since children are the experts at play, who better to look to as models for how to do more of it in our own lives? Children can teach us a lot about having fun.

4) They don’t have to work at being authentic. Before children start internalizing society’s messages about who they’re supposed to be and how they’re supposed to act, they express themselves naturally and without pretense. Unless others teach them how to do it, they don’t criticize themselves or put up a front. Their original nature is to be purely, authentically themselves. And that’s our original nature too. But an adult lifetime’s worth of internalizing messages about who we should be tends to limit us from being who we are. Allow the children in your life to serve as a reminder that you don’t have to be who others want you to be—being you is wonderfully enough. Children can teach us a lot about being ourselves.

5) They ask for help when they need it. Our society prizes independence and self-sufficiency. We’re pressured to have it all together all the time; so when we don’t, we often feel like we’ve failed. Admitting that we need help can feel like a form of weakness, so we try everything in our power to avoid doing it. We wear ourselves out and go through unnecessary suffering to avoid uttering the words, “I need help.” Children are supposed to be dependent. They’re not supposed to have all the answers, and nobody expects them to do everything on their own. When they need help, they don’t hesitate to ask for it. Neither should you. Children can teach us a lot about asking for help.

When we are open to learning from them, children can serve as remarkable teachers. They can remind us of who we once were and who we can be again. They can be our greatest role models, if only we let them.

“While we try to teach our children all about life, our children teach us what life is all about.” – Angela Schwindt