by rachelthemuse | Sep 10, 2018 | Alcohol/Substance Use, Emotional Intelligence, Mental Health, Positivity, Self-care
Mindfulness has become sort of a catchall term for general self-help advice that focuses on using different practices to attune better to your mind and actions with the hopes of decreasing stress or associated symptoms. Take time to meditate in the morning. Pay attention to your food when you’re eating. Do a gratitude practice every night. Self-care your stress away. It all sounds good in theory, and certainly won’t do you any harm, but what does the term mindfulness really encompass, and is it really something that could change your life? Or it is just another fad and buzzword in the self-improvement culture of today?
As a therapist, I frequently encourage different types of mindfulness practices to encourage my clients to be intentional about their own lives. Attuning to our bodies and our minds and our habits is an important part of both gaining control over our lives as well as our mentality. I often work with people who have had something terrible, or heartbreaking, or unexpected happen to them, and they are struggling for a sense of control. In those times I am often reminded that sometimes the only thing you have control over is your mentality. Sometimes I get pushback from people who don’t necessarily believe that their mentality is within their own power. Their thoughts are stuck in places that leave them thinking:
- How can I help the way I feel?
- What I believe is what I believe, there’s no changing it.
- How can changing my mentality change my circumstances?
- Thinking about my mentality doesn’t change the problems I’m facing.
I can understand why it might sound like a load of new age fluff when people start talking about mindfulness. We have become accustomed to solutions that start and end with well-defined explanations and prescriptions. We like to be able to have a blood test tell us exactly what’s wrong and what treatment is needed to fix the issue. Unfortunately, our minds can be even more mysterious than our bodies are, at least in this day and age. The good news is that our minds are also a lot more powerful than we might believe, and that means that we can use our mentality to improve our overall sense of wellbeing.
I wanted to find out what we really know about mindfulness, and what the evidence says about whether or not it works. Researchers have been studying mindfulness based practices for over 30 years now, and studies have investigated mindfulness as a treatment for conditions such as addiction, trauma recovery, stress, chronic pain, eating disorders, depression, anxiety, and more. There was no shortage of research to comb through devoted to mindfulness and it’s various applications, but the results were pretty consistent. Of course, with large bodies of research on a topic as broad as mindfulness, there are going to be variations in the results that studies present. I found the results optimistic, though. There is consistent evidence that when people are introduced to mindfulness based practices as a way to improve symptoms related to various stressors, they report good outcomes when they apply that knowledge.
Because mindfulness practices can be broad in terms of the actual strategies they refer to, here’s a few ideas about what people are referring to when they use that term:
- Deep-breathing practices
- Meditation (guided or self)
- Attuning to senses
- Intentional gratitude practices
- Night-time de-stressing rituals
- Conscious attention to mentality
- Intentional eating practices
Much of the research out there on mindfulness focuses on using one or more of these practices in a specific setting with a specific group of people. So the ways in which this area has been studied lends itself to a lot of different outcomes for a lot of different kinds of people with different kinds of problems. Nevertheless, I found a lot of examples of some really great ways that mindfulness practices are having a positive impact on people.
A study on mindfulness and addiction published this year found that mindfulness based interventions (MBIs) had a significant effect on cravings and substance misuse in treatment for addictions. This is a great example of how mindfulness practices can function as an auxiliary treatment for people. The goal of a mindfulness practices is not necessarily to serve as a replacement for other therapies, but it can be a good asset to use in addition to other treatment, and can function as a sort of enhancer. It may just give people an extra boost when they are seeking help for addictions or other mental health conditions.
Another encouraging example includes this study from PLOS One, which found that over a 6 year period in which medical and psychology students were introduced to mindfulness practices, the students reported significant increases in measures of their wellbeing. This is especially important given the high rates of mental distress, burnout, and suicide amongst medical professionals. As a person in a caregiving profession myself, I know how important it is to maintain a healthy mentality and how overwhelming the stress can get. It’s good to know more evidence is showing how important it is for caregivers to be given the resources and support to incorporate these practices themselves.
Another study from the International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health found more evidence that introducing mindfulness in the workplace decreased burnout and reduced stress. This research supports my personal belief that employers should do more to help mitigate stress in the workplace and support the health of their employees by taking it upon themselves to bring stress reduction into the workplace environment. Not only do I believe this will improve employee health and help workers be happier in their work environments, I think it will make workplaces more efficient as well.
There is a lot more research out there on the topic, which I will be working on delving into more this month. However, these studies are a few examples of the research support out there for bringing mindfulness practices into our lives. Our lives have gotten so much more harried and complicated, and sometimes our choices seem out of our control. That’s why mindfulness is helpful in bringing a sense of focus and calm to your mentality, so that you feel more capable of handling whatever life happens to be throwing at you at the moment.
Mindfulness alone cannot solve every problem that you may have, but becoming more intentional about taking care of your mind and staying tuned in to how your mentality impacts your overall mood could help you stick to your goals and keep negativity at bay.
by rachelthemuse | Sep 4, 2018 | Emotional Intelligence, Mental Health, Motivation, Positivity, Self-care
When you are experiencing overwhelming anxiety, or even having a panic attack, sensory distraction can help you re-focus your energy somewhere other than the distress you are feeling. It’s a technique that involves using your senses to distract you long enough for you to calm down or regain your composure. I’m going to discuss a few ways to utilize these techniques and give you some examples so that you can have some extra skills for self-soothing.
You have 5 senses: sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch, all of which can be used to help you re-focus and calm down when you are having high stress moments. For each of these there are at least a few ways that you can stimulate your senses to help you distract during high moments of stress or anxiety. I often recommend these techniques for my clients who are trying to find non-medical ways of coping with anxiety and panic attacks.
Sight
There are a couple ways you can use sight as a sensory distraction. You can walk outside and start looking around you and focusing on what you see, preferably natural objects, like branches swaying in the wind or clouds moving through the sky. Start to really look for details and try to absorb as much information through your visual observations as possible. Trying to concentrate and store information will challenge your brain to focus it’s energy on something else besides the distress you are feeling at the moment. You could also choose a photograph, piece of artwork or another type of image or object that you find to be symbolic to you. This could be a picture of a relative or family member you love, or something with religious or spiritual significance to you. Just find something that you can look at to remind yourself to center and shift your focus outside of the current moment.
Sound
Music is an excellent way to use sensory distraction. However, choose your music wisely. If you are feeling depressed and you go turn on your sad music, you’re not going to feel better. With music we want to think about using opposites. If you are angry or anxious, listen to something uplifting or calming. If you are feeling depressed, turn up your favorite feel good music. Another way to use sound is through the use of meditation apps, audiobooks, or podcasts. Again, think about your choices here. Don’t exacerbate your current distress by listening to something that will further your feelings of anger, anxiety, or sadness. Use an app to calm down with guided meditation, listen to a motivational audiobook, or subscribe to a podcast with a positive theme.
Smell
Using smell as a sensory distraction can be very beneficial. Essential oils are great for this part. Good essential oils to use for calming include Lavender Essential Oil, Frankincense Essential Oil 
, andBlack Spruce Essential Oil 
. You can actually just grab the bottle and inhale the scents from there, or you could use them in an essential oil diffuser
. You can apply on your skin too, but you may need to dilute it with a carrier oil like coconut oil before rubbing directly on your skin. Carry a small bottle of lavender with you for quick aromatherapy whenever you need it.
Taste
For this sense, you can think of it in terms of temperature, and focus on either drinking a very cold glass of water or a hot cup of tea. Alternatively, you could suck or chew on a piece of ice. Cooling your body temperature may help calm you down some. You could also try chewing gum or bubble gum, to get more sensation on your tongue and again bring your energy to a different place of focus.
Touch
For touch, you could always just grab a stress ball and squeeze away. However, one technique I’ve found can be useful is running your wrists under cold water. Just turn on the faucet and let cool water run over your pulse points, and it may help calm you down by lowering your body temperature slightly and giving you a peaceful sensation on your wrists. You could also use ice for this, either by rubbing ice on your wrist or perhaps your neck and chest. If you have a history of self-harming behaviors, using ice as an alternative to cutting is a good strategy, or you can also use the rubber-band snap method. That just involves wearing a rubber-band on your wrist and snapping it occasionally or when needed to provide an instantaneous re-direction of your focus towards the snapping sensation on your skin. As always, be mindful of what works for you as an individual. With a history of self-harm, you want to make sure this is going to be helpful rather than triggering, so use your own best judgement as to what techniques might be most helpful to you and follow your instincts.
Using these techniques may help you pull some energy away from the feelings of anxiety or panic you are experiencing. By focusing attention to our senses, we give our bodies a chance to let go of that anxiety and re-direct our energy towards something more positive or healing. When managing anxiety, you will benefit from having multiple resources to pull from in order to build your set of coping skills. These techniques can be part of your overall strategy to help manage your symptoms.
by rachelthemuse | Aug 27, 2018 | Cognitive Distortions, Emotional Intelligence, Friendship, Mental Health, Positivity
As part of my ongoing series about cognitive distortions, I’m going address Emotional Reasoning in this post. Emotional reasoning refers to the mistaken belief that everything you feel must be true. In this way, we can sometimes trick ourselves into believing that our feelings are facts. To the contrary, sometimes our emotions cloud our judgement, and we don’t always read the situation correctly when we allow our emotions to affect our interpretation of the situation we are in. Sometimes we need to step back from our emotional response to a situation and try to see if our emotions are taking us to a conclusion that may not be really true.
Here are some examples of emotional reasoning and thoughts that may occur when you might need to think twice about whether or not what you feel is really true:
- “ I feel rejected and hurt, and therefore you have rejected me”
- In this case, someone may or may not have rejected you. A person may have been trying to set boundaries with you by telling you not to call repeatedly when they are unavailable. Your feelings of rejection may be due to insecurities you have, but you also need to respect the boundaries other people set in their own lives and relationships. Or perhaps you were passed over for a job offer, and you were one qualified candidate in a competitive position, but fell short of the final cut. This doesn’t mean the company didn’t think you would have done a good job or that your skill set wasn’t valuable.
- “I feel like a bad friend, therefore I must be a bad friend.”
- Sometimes you may judge yourself too harshly for making a mistake. Being human, you’re bound to do things you regret from time to time, but this doesn’t make you a terrible person. When you do make mistakes, try to own up to them and repair the damage when you can, but don’t believe that you are defined by every mistake you’ve ever made.
- “I feel lonely, therefore no one cares about me”
- It’s hard to face problems on your own when you don’t have much support from others. However, sometimes we can get to feeling overwhelmed with the prospect of reaching out to others when we feel vulnerable and need support. Oftentimes, it’s easier to sit with our feelings by ourselves than acknowledge that we need help. However it’s important to reach out to your support system when you can. Sometimes, your friends and family may not know that you are struggling, but would want to be there for you if they could. It’s important when you feel this way to step back from your emotions and try to account for the support that you DO have, even if it’s not in the most likely places.
- “I’m angry with you, therefore you must have done something wrong.”
- Anger is difficult to step back from, but it’s very important that you understand where your anger is coming from and how much control you have over it. Sometimes we get angry with others for things that cause us distress, but often times anger is really a reflection of how we’re feelings about ourselves. For example, you may feel angry at your partner for not doing something you expected from them, but you never actually verbalized what you needed. You feel angry that your partner didn’t anticipate your needs, but you may not recognize that it was your responsibility to communicate your needs to your partner.
- “I feel worthless, therefore I am worthless.”
- Self-esteem can be a struggle if you have been suffering from a mental illness or have experienced trauma in your life. It can be hard to separate your feelings of low self-worth from your outlook on life, but this is where it’s important to take stock in what your values are. Sometimes we give other people more courtesy than we give ourselves. Whenever you find yourself struggling with negative thoughts about yourself, ask yourself who gave you those messages about yourself and if you would say those things to someone that you cared about. If you wouldn’t tell someone you care about that they are worthless, than you shouldn’t say those things to yourself. Feeling down or struggling with the situation you are in at this moment doesn’t mean that you have to listen to thoughts that make you feel worse about yourself.
Sometimes we get so caught up in our emotions that we choose to ignore evidence that goes against how we feel. So maybe your friend sent you an invitation to an event on Facebook, but because she didn’t reach out personally to make sure you were coming you still choose to believe she doesn’t really care if you come hang out or not. Or perhaps you become overwhelmed with a presentation you have to give at work, and take this to mean that you must be in over your head and you’re not cut out for the job, despite the fact that your supervisor picked you for the project.
If you think you might be engaging in emotional reasoning and you want to make sure you are not letting your emotions cloud your judgment of the situation, ask yourself a few questions:
- Am I overlooking my strengths?
- Am I discounting evidence that would lead me to reach a different conclusion?
- Am I basing my conclusions on my emotions or facts?
- What would you say to a friend that was in your situation?
- Am I struggling to give myself the same advice that I would give to my friend?
These questions will help you evaluate your situation with more clarity and determine if emotional reasoning is getting in the way of your progress. Emotions are important, and we shouldn’t just ignore them. But keep in mind that relying on our emotions to guide us doesn’t always give us the full picture of what’s happening and what all of our options are. Don’t forget that you are in charge of your mentality, even when it gets overwhelming.
For more on Cognitive Distortions, check out the other posts in this series:
Cognitive Distortions 3.0: Personalization
Cognitive Distortions 2.0: Disqualifying the Positive
Coping with Cognitive Distortions: Catastrophizing
by rachelthemuse | Aug 13, 2018 | Cognitive Distortions, Emotional Intelligence, Motivation, Self-care
This is the 3rd post in my series about Cognitive Distortions, and I am going to cover Personalization. This is a distortion that can include believing that you are responsible for things outside of your control, or it could also mean interpreting things in a way that always reflects back on you. As with all cognitive distortions, this may be something that we have all done once in a while, but if you find that you get in the habit of taking things personally when you don’t really need to, you may want to reflect on how you’re thinking about events that happen around you.
On the first part, believing that you are responsible for things that are actually out of your control, you might feel a sense of guilt or shame about things that are not your fault or that you couldn’t have controlled. For example, if your partner is struggling with a health condition, but isn’t following their treatment recommendations, and you then feel responsible for not doing enough to help when their health declines. Supporting your partner doesn’t mean that you have to take responsibility for things that are out of your control. It’s always important to understand what you do have control over, because we all need to be able to take responsibility for our own actions and choices when we can. Yet we also need to understand when something is out of our control, and recognize our own limitations.
The second part of Personalization is when you turn things around to reflect on you when an event or situation may not be about you at all. Sometimes this comes from a sense of insecurity or anxiety. For example, if you walk into the break room at work, and everyone stops talking, and you mistakenly start to believe that everyone must be talking about you behind your back. In reality, that could have happened for any number of reasons. Maybe they were discussing something private, or maybe it was just one of those weird moments when the room goes quiet. Regardless, if you don’t know for certain what’s going on, you don’t have to waste your energy worrying about it. Sometimes we think situaitons are about us when they really are not. One thing to consider is that most of the time, other people are worried about themselves and thinking about themselves. This just means that most of the time they’re not thinking or worrying about you. Of course there are people who spend their time focused on other people, and in general you don’t want to spend too much time involved with people who gossip or are just snarky in general. Even when someone is treating you poorly, their behavior is about them, not you. It’s easier to handle difficult people when you realize that the way they treat others is actually a reflection of how they feel about themselves. Most of the time, you won’t be able to do anything to change those kinds of people, so you just need to focus on being the kind of person you want be.
If you find that you are often personalizing situations at times when you don’t need to, reflect on why you think this has become a pattern. You may need to ask yourself why you feel responsible for things that you cannot control, or if you are holding yourself to a high standard that no one could realistically meet. Sometimes you may need to ask yourself “is this really about me?” to get a better understanding of a situation and understand how much control you really have. Try to practice asking yourself some of these questions when you are thinking about a situation and believe that it is about you or something you did. If you think that insecurity or anxiety is playing a role in how you are interpreting a situation, you can practice reminding yourself that you are working on not personalizing situations. This is one of those times when I will often recommend developing a personal mantra. A mantra can be any simple phrase that you use to center your thoughts and help clear your mind of negativity. It could be as simple as something like “Peace,” or it could be something more specific. For more on developing a personal mantra, see this post:
The Power of a Personal Mantra
Changing patterns of thinking can be challenging, but the good news is that with practice it becomes easier. Once you are used to reflecting on your thoughts and taking more control over your own mindset, you will be building your emotional intelligence and you will feel more in control over your mentality and your moods.
For more about cognitive distortions, see my other posts in this series:
Coping with Cognitive Distortions: Catastrophizing
Cognitive Distortions 2.0: Disqualifying the Positive
by rachelthemuse | Aug 8, 2018 | Emotional Intelligence, Mental Health, Motivation, Positivity, Self-care
Having a personal mantra is something that everyone can benefit from. When I work with people who have struggled with self-esteem, feelings of anxiety or even feelings of grief or depression, I have often encouraged clients to develop a personal mantra as a way of staying centered, focused, and calm in the face of difficult emotions. Having a personal mantra can help you when you begin to feel overwhelmed, anxious, frustrated or defeated. One great thing about personal mantras is that you don’t have to have just one, and you don’t even have to make it up yourself.
Take, for example, the Serenity Prayer. This is a common mantra that is used in addiction recovery circles and elsewhere, and it basically says: “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference” [original credit from the American theologian Reinhold Niebuhr]. Your mantra can be something like this, an inspirational quote with a spiritual focus, or it can be completely different. You could use a song lyric that particularly speaks to you, or something your mother told you frequently when you were growing up that still resonates with you today. The power of a mantra is in its ability to help you focus your mental energy in a positive direction when you need to transition out of negative thought patterns. People often turn to inspirational quotes or wise old sayings in order to provide some comfort and hope during times of struggle (i.e: “this too, shall pass”).
Creating a personal mantra is just about using the messages that resonate most with you and provide you with encouragement and hope when you need a mental re-set. It serves as a source of positive affirmation and directs you to put your energy in a more productive direction. Whatever words you decide to use for your personal mantra, claim them! Decide that this is your new mantra and you are going to use that positive affirmation to help you through your current struggles or to keep you inspired. You don’t have to go around telling everyone, just make sure you internalize that message and use it when you need to.
Tips for creating and using a personal mantra:
– Think about your favorite inspirational quotes, song lyrics from your favorite artists, or words of wisdom you have heard or picked up on from other people you know, OR just make something up and inspire yourself
– Make your mantra short and easy to remember
– Make sure your mantra reflects something you actually BELIEVE
– Ensure that the mantras you will use are positive, uplifting, and encouraging (avoid picking something like “Life sucks and then you die”)
– Post visual images of your mantra in places where you will see it (in your wallet, on your bedroom mirror, on the wallpaper of your computer screen)
– Set a daily reminder to reflect on your mantra at a useful time such as when you first get up in the morning, or before you step into that dreaded Monday meeting that always sours your mood
– Keep repeating the mantra to yourself silently when you are struggling
– Pick more than one if needed
– You can use one for times when you are overwhelmed (“Serenity Now!”), and another for times you need to be inspired (“I can create the life that I want”)
I have several mantras that I use a various times in my life, but just to share, one that I use is “Get out of the Pool”. This phrase is connected to an analogy I use with my clients sometimes, referring to drowning in a pool of self-doubt or negative self-talk. It means that when I feel like I am lingering too long in self-doubt or negative thoughts, I need to get out of that pool before I drown. Sometimes I have to remind myself to get out of the pool, because I’m wasting my times there and it’s not helping me in any positive or tangible way to keep marinating in that self-doubt.
Once you start intentionally incorporating your personal mantra in your life, you will find that its power will grow. Changing our thought patterns and our limiting beliefs can be done, but you must make a conscious decision that you will actively work to re-focus your energy in a positive direction. You do not have to change everything in your life overnight but starting to use a personal mantra will help you shift your energy and focus in a way that will feel more empowering and will help you get through those times when your thoughts feel like they are controlling you instead of the other way around.
This post originally appeared on Medium.com.
by rachelthemuse | Jul 31, 2018 | Cognitive Distortions, Emotional Intelligence, Mental Health, Motivation, Positivity, Self-care
This is the second post in the series I am doing about Cognitive Distortions. For more about what cognitive distortions are and how they negatively impact out life and world-view, see my first post on Coping with Cognitive Distortions: Catastrophizing.
This week I’m going to talk about another distortion called “Disqualifying the Positive”. Disqualifying the positive means we are recognizing only negative aspects of a situation while ignoring the positive. Perhaps you receive a compliment or a positive statement on an evaluation you receive at work or a paper you have turned in, but you only focus on the single negative feedback you also received on your work. When you are in the habit of disqualifying the positive, it makes it hard to recognize the good things you have done, leaving you feeling inadequate, or sometimes even worthless or incompetent. Therapists sometimes refer to this as having a case of the “Yes, but…”s.
Have you ever had a friend that was feeling down, but when you tried to cheer them up, they just refuted everything positive you had to say? Perhaps you tried to compliment someone on a new opportunity they received at work, and the response was “Yes, but they only gave it to me because they already promoted Becky and she’s not around to do it anymore”. When we constantly disqualify the positive things we have going for us in life, or only look to the negative aspects of the situation, we are really not looking at the given situation with the true lenses of reality. Not only is it inaccurate, you’re missing out on the joy you could be experiencing by allowing yourself to recognize the positive things you have going for you.
In life there are few things that are all good or all bad. Even if you’re going to take a vacation in Hawaii, there’s no way you’re getting around that long plane ride. However, if you focus only on how long and cramped and boring the plane ride will be and how much you’re not looking forward to it, you’ll arrive at your vacation grumpy and tired. Some people have a special knack for disqualifying the positive wherever they go, and in general these people aren’t the most pleasant to be around. Other people always have to spend time pointing out to them the positive aspects of the given situation until they begrudgingly accept that there may be a positive to be found somewhere in there.
The antidote to this cognitive distortion is gratitude. Looking for places to find gratitude wherever you go can be a habit that you cultivate. When we look for the positive in any situation we face, we become happier overall, and we become more resilient to negative situations or feedback when it does happen. Some people can accomplish this with starting a gratitude practice, or you can journal about things you are grateful for. They can be very simple things. Even when negative experiences happen, there is usually a lesson that can be taken from the experience, or a kernel of gratitude that can be found if you look for it. If you lose a loved one, perhaps you choose to include a reflection of the positive memories you had with that person as you journey through your grief process, or perhaps you choose to honor their memory by giving back to a charity your loved one cared about. It doesn’t make the loss go away, but it can help with the grieving process and take something negative and insert a little positivity into the situation. There is a great list of simple things to be grateful for over at Radical Transformation Project here:
50 Things to be Grateful for Right Now
For some people, particularly if you have struggled with depression or low self-esteem in your life, looking for the positive doesn’t come naturally. That’s okay because it is a habit that can be changed if you want to start thinking in a more positive and realistic way about your life and your accomplishments. You do not have to automatically disqualify everything positive that happens to you just because there are also negative things that happen. When we ruminate on the negative and give that negativity more energy than we give positivity, the negativity starts to rule our lives. Sometimes, that negative voice that sneaks up on you when something good happens may really be the voice of someone who abused or neglected you, someone who convinced you that you were not worthy of enjoying your life, or that you didn’t deserve good things and didn’t deserve to be recognized when you did something well. Many of us have to learn to combat those negative voices in our heads by consciously choosing to listen to the positive. Think about it like having that little devil on one shoulder and that little angel on then other shoulder. The little angel is trying to say something positive to you, and that little devil just whispers in your other ear “Yes, but…”
Make a decision that you are going to start recognizing the good aspects of the situations you find yourself in, and stop disqualifying the positive. As with any problem, the first step is recognizing that the problem exists and making a commitment to want to change it. When you start to hear “Yes, but…” creeping into your vocabulary, that’s when you know it’s time to brush the little devil off your shoulder and listen to what your little angel has to say to you. It’s okay to be proud of yourself, it’s okay to be imperfect, and it’s okay to take the good along with the bad in any given situation. This doesn’t mean that we put on rose colored glasses and ignore negative situations that need to be attended to or dealt with. It just means that we don’t disqualify the positive at the same time, thereby robbing ourselves of the ability to see both the good and the bad in a situation.
Battling cognitive distortions is not about disqualifying the negative or never making a plan to deal with a bad situation. It just means that we are looking at the full picture with attention to what the reality of the situation is, so that we don’t over-emphasize negativity when it’s not warranted.
, andBlack Spruce Essential Oil 
. You can actually just grab the bottle and inhale the scents from there, or you could use them in an essential oil diffuser
. You can apply on your skin too, but you may need to dilute it with a carrier oil like coconut oil before rubbing directly on your skin. Carry a small bottle of lavender with you for quick aromatherapy whenever you need it.