mental health

A grounding practice for winter

| jamiefeinberg

Friends, my head is so in the clouds that I entirely forgot to write a blog post earlier this week. So as I often do, I pondered what I could use support with today, and I think it’s definitely time to move out of my head and into my body. So, I hope this practice is helpful, either as a practice to try on or as inspiration to find your own practices when you need them.

If you’re someone who struggles to meditate, if it’s accessible for you, consider doing some vigorous exercise (at least enough to get your heart rate up) before doing the exercise below. I find that if I’ve already gotten my blood pumping, it’s easier to me to slow down and tap into my wise mind. I have less swirling thoughts that way.Subscribed

Here’s the practice in written form, or you can listen to the meditation as well here.

Begin by stopping. Allow yourself to pay attention to your breath. Observe the inhale and the exhale. Notice the temperature of your breath. Observe the rhythm. In, and out. In and out.

Make a commitment to you, right now. To taking time for you. When intrusive thoughts, or any thoughts, start to pop in, let them go.

Find a quiet place to sit, a comfy position to take, if you haven’t yet. Close your eyes if that feels comfortable for you to do so. Feel the surface beneath you. Observe its texture, and feel the weight of your body on whatever surface it is on.

Feel your limbs, wherever they are. Observe any tension you’re holding onto. Notice the sensations of your body.

Find your toes, if you’ve got some. Give them a wiggle. Notice the muscles that get involved when we wiggle our toes. See how many of them you can find.

Listen to the sounds around you. Notice the close sounds. Notice the far sounds. Notice the sound of your own breath.

Take a moment to give yourself a hug. Feel the physical sensations of touch, weight, and maybe even notice the temperatures you feel.

Relax your limbs. As you breathe in and out, do a quick body scan to notice any tension you’re holding onto, from your head all the way down your torso and into your feet. If you’d like to, breathe into the spots where you feel tension. Observe the sensations that call your attention.

Gently and being careful not to hurt yourself, tighten the muscles of your body, from your head down into your feet. Observe what it feels like to hold those sensations. See what small details you can be present to.

Relax. Relax all the muscles, and notice what differences you feel now that you’ve let go of that extra tension.

If you’re comfortable doing so, this is a beautiful time to choose a positive phrase to repeat a few times, in your head or out loud (which can be even better for grounding purposes). A message like “I am enough” or “I am grateful” or “I am loved” or anything else that resonates for you can work.

When you’re ready, if you have your eyes closed, open them. Focus your attention on an object in front of you, or near you. Notice the details of it – the color, texture, shadows. See if you can observe a detail you haven’t noticed before. No need to analyze it – just allow yourself to take it in with your eyes, with attention.

Find a new object to focus on. Observe its color, its texture. Allow any extra thoughts to float away.

And now, before you return to your regularly scheduled day, allow yourself a moment to observe how you are feeling in this moment. Consider if you’d like to take a pause like this more often in your day.

That’s it, folks. I’d love to hear if you appreciated this today, and whether you’d like more recordings like this one.

To learn more about mental fitness and mindfulness, take a saboteur assessment.

Work with me

Take good care. Keep resisting.

Creating space, allowing stillness

| jamiefeinberg

I’m reading a book in one of my Enneagram groups, and it has reminded me of the importance of allowing stillness and silence in my day to day life. As an Enneagram 1/type A go-getter who is constantly DOING things, it is not my habit to pause. And like so many of us, I am getting more and more used to distraction. I might turn on a video while cooking, a podcast while walking, or pull out a book in between work projects. 

But what I was reminded of today, and what has been useful, is that God or our inner wise one (insert your language of choice) is found in the stillness. Without pauses, we can’t get in tune with what’s best for us. And infuriatingly, we cannot will those wise revelations to show up in our lives. All we can do is practice pausing. Then we can leave it to the universe to do what it will with us. 

Photo of red, purple and yellow tulips by Pixabay

When my internet is being slow as I work today, I am trying to choose stillness instead of distracting myself while I wait for things to load. 

When I am not sure what to do next, I am trying to breathe and sit. Let me find the answer in stillness, because it isn’t coming in the “doing”. 

How do you create space? Are you allowing stillness or silence? If not, what’s one small way you’d like to try it? 

Recent articles from me you might enjoy: 

Anxious for the future? Quiet and control those hyper-vigilant thoughts

Finding gratitude while facing fascism

Enjoy the sun

10 ways your mind is messing with you

Joy as resistance

Tell me when I can pre-order your book!

P.S. Want some support in finding stillness? Let’s chat!

Five Ways To Make the Holidays Work For You This Season

| jamiefeinberg

How are you feeling, friend? Let’s take a moment to just be. Observe your breathing, in and out, if that feels comfortable for you. Or take a look at a pretty object or window near you, and observe what you see. Count backwards from 20. Let’s just be for a moment. 

It may be cliche at this point, but it’s that time of year when it’s common to take time to be grateful. I know I’m not alone in having a dedicated gratitude practice (running on at least five years now, wild!), and if you haven’t yet tried it, whether during the holiday season or any time of year, I definitely recommend it.

Back in 2020, I wrote a blog on how to make the holidays work for you. At the time, a lot of people were struggling with the holidays and how to celebrate them. While Ross and I were living an RV and used to doing our own thing for the holidays, we were aware of local grocery shortages on preferred foods, and where we were staying, in New Mexico, actually had a stay-at-home order in place over Thanksgiving that I’m sure was challenging for many. 

I’m grateful that a lot has changed for the better since then (namely, vaccines!), but the holidays are still a challenging time for many, whether due to viruses in the air or distance from family (physical or otherwise) or the challenges that happen when we return home and revert to our younger, less wise selves (or when our family assume we are the same person we once were, even if we aren’t!). Or all of the above, perhaps? 

It’s okay to have mixed feelings.

It’s okay to have moments when you feel wrapped up in the love of or even memories of your family/friends. 

It’s okay to, in the next moment, feel anxiety that your parents are going to do x, or miss loved ones, or feel resentment that you can’t do holiday celebration you did in the past, or feel jealous of y, who lives with their family or has many close friends while you are living and celebrating alone.

I hope that during this challenging time, you will give yourself forgiveness for these feelings. All emotions are valid. Offer yourself grace. I know you’re carrying a lot, and opportunities for anxiety and other challenging emotions abound. 

It may be helpful to remember that if someone else’s life looks glamorous on social media, that is just the tip of the iceberg that you’re seeing. The glamorous surface life may be only a passing moment in a chaotic day or week or month.

Here are a few things I recommend making time for this week, whatever your plans are. 

  • Practice gratitude – and mean it. This can take many forms, and all are valid. Start each morning picturing one thing you’re looking forward to today, in vivid detail, and then realize it. (A warm shower? A cup of tea? Enjoy the magic of simple pleasures you get to bring into your day.) Start or end each day by acknowledging five things you’re grateful for. Start a gratitude journal, whether it’s a big beautiful book or a note on your phone. If you’re connected with your family, begin a meal/Zoom call/family walk by having everyone share something they are thankful for this year.
  • Make time for exercise. I love indulging in rich holiday foods, as many of us do. Most of us, at least in the corporate sector or education, are also lucky enough to get time off this week. It can be tempting to use that time to relax on the couch, but making time to take a walk or stretch or lift some weights will give you more energy for the festivities and encourage you to enjoy your indulgences more, without guilt. This isn’t about losing weight. It’s about how you feel. Bonus points for combining it with outside time. 
  • Don’t let comparison steal your joy. Have you ever attended a family gathering or friend event and felt like everyone else had it “figured out” except for you? Ever find yourself stretching to describe your own work in a way that puts you in the best light? Ever wish you could be more honest, but find yourself afraid to admit where things haven’t been going your way yet? I find myself using authenticity as an antidote in these cases. And focusing on the good, the things you can be grateful for, is so key. I don’t have to talk about my work. Or I can focus on the happy feeling x gives me, rather than the funds in my bank account or how stressed I’ve been feeling covering for so and so lately. When I envy other’s travel or title, I turn my attention to all the joyful things I am grateful for in my own life. Eyes on your own paper, friends. This can also be a signal to get off of social media and dive into a book, go for a walk, dance to a holiday tune, or watch a favorite movie with a cup of a warm beverage. 
  • Carve out time for yourself. I love my family, but as an introvert who isn’t always her best self at large family gatherings, I’ve worked hard over the years to set boundaries for myself. For me, part of a successful holiday season is making time for my morning routine and making sure I have time to relax on my own. Even living far from family, it can be easy to fill my schedule with Zooms or friend gatherings if I am not mindful of my own needs. If you’re having trouble seeing blank space on your calendar, take a moment to block out a morning or an hour for you each week, or even 5-10 minutes each day. It will help you to be at your best if you are celebrating with others too. 
  • Strive to let go of perfection & release your expectations. I think one of the toughest parts of the holiday season is that we tend to bring to it so many expectations, whether it’s from holidays we experienced in the past, popular culture from movies and books that romanticize the holidays, or a growing awareness of limited time and not wanting to disappoint our loved ones. This season, when you catch yourself judging yourself, those around you, or the situations you are in, can you let those judgments go instead? What would it feel like, when you had a thought creep in, to look at your surroundings with loving attention and gratitude? To be present to joy, instead of to lack or imperfection?

Whatever your plans are this year, I hope you’ll find some comfort or guidance in this advice. No one has your best interests at heart in the same way you do, so go create a holiday schedule that will light you up and invigorate you.

Take care, and Happy Holidays! This may be my last check-in before 2025, so I wish you all the best as you end 2024 and look ahead to 2025. 

P.S. Are you ready for a shift? The holidays can truly bring out our lowest versions of ourselves – the parts we are least proud of. If/when you’d like to learn more about the ways we sabotage ourselves and carve out a path forward, please join me for a Saboteur Assessment. And if you’re curious about the role your personality plays in your life and find yourself Enneagram-curious, or you want to take advantage of my BOGO coaching deal before it expires Monday, send me a message to learn more or get started with us in January.

Photo credit (of strings of white lights in the dark): Dzenina Lukac

The Enneagram, COVID, and Me

| jamiefeinberg

What an interesting week this has been! Saturday afternoon, as I chatted with family on the phone and walked by the water in downtown Charlottetown, I received a text from my husband saying he had COVID. Oh joy! 

Given that we live in a two bedroom apartment, I knew there was a decent chance I’d already gotten it, but in case I hadn’t, we began Operation: Isolation in earnest. 

It’s fascinating, going from a fully shared space to masking in “public spaces”, avoiding each other’s presence, and carefully planning use of the kitchen or bathroom. 

The Enneagram, if you aren’t familiar with it, is my favorite tool for understanding personality, myself, and how I relate to other people. I’m a card-carrying Enneagram 1, and part of that means I am in the dependence stance: as a result, I have had to do a ton of boundary work, because my natural instinct is to accommodate other people and ditch my own plans. This is especially true with my husband. 

I began this COVID-venture assuming that it would be really tough for me to keep so much distance from my husband. Especially so because physical touch is so important to me (it’s definitely one of my love languages, if you ascribe to that). 

After a day or so’s transition though, I was pleasantly surprised to see how much I’d gotten used to the new normal. In some ways, it was freeing that I had to do my own thing, and trust my husband to do his. And in fact, I found that being in the midst of “Operation: Avoid COVID” worked really well for my rule-following 1 personality. I’ve been so busy masking and otherwise checking the boxes that I haven’t been nearly as preoccupied worrying about my husband’s needs or desires. 

Fascinating. 

In my mental fitness work, we refer to this as being a curious anthropologist. While my inner critic or judge voice might get judgmental and opinionated about my recent behavior, I’ve found it quite easy to tap into my curiosity and just observe myself and my behavior. 

And that’s something the Enneagram offers me in spades. I have names and a much fuller understanding of why I do what I do then ever before – and as you can see here, I keep learning, week by week and day by day, even more about myself and the world. 

Last night we had an informal get together for the members of our Enneagram Book Club, and it was a wonderful opportunity for community and learning. As I always do, I left feeling more confident about who I am and more aware of the ways I am both different and the same from other people. And I continue to feel gratitude that such wonderful people choose to join my programs and work with me. 

Have you ever had this kind of “curious anthropologist” experience in your own life? What did it show you? 

P.S. There are lots of ways to work with me in the new year! Do a Saboteur Assessment, an Enneagram intro, or just contact me to learn more!

Photo description: box of tissues in the foreground, with a mug of tea and a person with their setup for dealing with being sick in the distance

Photo credit: Cottonbro studio

Processing post-election panic

| jamiefeinberg

Where do you begin, when your worst fears seem to be coming true?

How do you process it? And what do you do?

Photo credit: Marek from Pixabay

Back in 2020, when it became clear we might be facing a second term of Trump, my husband and I were fearful for our future. We relied on affordable health insurance as self-employed people and people with pre-existing conditions. We had one plan available to us as we traveled the country in our RV. If that plan went away, or if, even worse, all affordable health care went away for those who were self-employed, we wouldn’t be able to do the work that we loved. Not to mention fears around bodily autonomy and the Supreme Court.

So while in 2016 we’d done a bit of research into moving to Canada, we got serious about it in 2020. Ultimately, for us, the path forward involved my husband going back to school.

We knew we might be overreacting, but we felt like we needed to prioritize our own survival (including mental health) first. So we went for it. We knew we were super privileged. But we felt we needed to put our own oxygen mask on first and avoid becoming a burden to our friends and family if we stuck around and weren’t able to make things work.

Unfortunately, there have been several times since we moved here that we’ve been reminded that some of our worst fears have come true. Reproductive rights being the stunning one. And of course, now, it feels like that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

My work isn’t political on the surface. I help people to create a life they love. Sometimes that’s career coaching, sometimes it’s life coaching. Sometimes it’s mental fitness work or exploring spirituality or many other topics. But I’ve always been passionate about human rights. The rights of everyone to make their own, empowered choices, regardless of what other people expect or advise or prefer. The rights of ALL of us, without judgment of our gender or if we’re trans, the rights of all of us under the 2SGLTQIA+ umbrella, whatever our skin color or country of origin or religion or abilities or neurodiversity…you get the idea.

I want everyone to be fully supported in becoming their full, authentic selves, bringing their own unique gifts and perspective to the world, because I believe that makes the world a better place. If we all had our needs met and could tap into what we do best, I truly think so much fear and anger and hate around the world would start to disappear.

Facing the news yesterday, I observed myself moving through a series of emotions. I’d feel mad, frustrated, fearful, sad, anxious about the future. I’d then catch myself in my emotions and do some grounding work to regulate myself. And then, soon enough, my thoughts would take over again. Maybe I’m ten minutes into a task and another idea occurs to me and I’m in tears or raging. Things like:

  • What if we have another pandemic in the next four years?
  • What if Canada kicks my husband and me out unexpectedly?
  • What if my friends and family aren’t safe? How can I support them if things get really bad?
  • How do I respect and forgive my friends who prioritized their own concerns over what seems most pressing to me – the humanity and bodily autonomy of a majority of US citizens?
  • How do I stay regulated and not rage over inconsequential things (otherwise known as, tell me you’re an Enneagram 1 without telling me you’re an Enneagram 1)
  • I love the warmth of this tea…or this blue sky….How do I avoid losing sight of those gifts in my own fears right now?
  • How much time before it gets scary?
  • What about everyone who can’t leave?

In all of this, I keep coming back to gratitude. Anchoring into that has been useful for me.

  • Gratitude that I’m here in Canada
  • Gratitude for the community of people here as well as the global community of friends and family who love and support us
  • Gratitude for beautiful days, for a warm drink, for an apartment we can afford, for work that lights us up
  • Gratitude that right now, today, my friends and family are okay

And on and on.

Please take the time you need to acknowledge and process your emotions. And when you’re ready, use your tools to self-regulate, to lock into gratitude, to truly care for yourself and your needs right now.

I hope that in the coming days, if you’re also in the United States and feeling fearful (or, honestly, even if you aren’t), I hope you’ll consider asking yourself a few questions. Before doing so, I encourage you to make sure you’re in as grounded, calm, and wise a mindset as possible, to make sure that you answer these questions not from fear, but from love, with the best wisdom your mind has to offer:

  • Is there anything I’ve been putting off that I should get to soon?
  • Are there any steps I should take to keep myself and my loved ones safe?
  • Are there any conversations I need to have with friends or family?
  • What are my worst fears – and is there anything I can do today to alleviate them?

If you aren’t sure how to calm yourself down or change your emotional state, there are some wonderful tools out there, including many I teach. You can also check out this article I wrote in 2021 on breaking out of a funk.

Please don’t judge yourself or your friends or neighbors for how they’re processing things right now. As much as it might be tempting to, try to view yourself, and others, and even this situation, with curiosity. If we can tap into the wisest part of ourselves, acting from love for ourselves and those we care about, we are much better equipped to work efficiently, feel empathy, and know what’s needed from us in this moment.

(And on a lighter note, my friend Dave Agans has an amazingly hilarious series, a trio of books, the last of which I finally read recently. If you’re into quirky sci-fi or speculative fiction and humor, you might love The Urban Legion as much as I do. Somehow I feel like these might both resonate/feel prescient and also be a great way to relax right now.)

Take care, friends.

P.S. I’m going to begin offering a fifteen minute pause each week for us to reset. There’s no cost. If you want to join me to do some mindfulness exercises, ground ourselves, feel a little joy, and release those negative emotions, you are most welcome. You can sign up here. Alternately, I periodically coach and share in my Facebook group, Crafting the Life You Want.

Anxiety: a path forward

Woman in shades of pink walks forward into a canopy of trees
| jamiefeinberg

I keep changing and changing and changing this title, but in truth, I know exactly what I’m going to say. The conundrum, of course, is that while I have learned that anxiety, even lifelong, chronic anxiety struggles, can get better, I also don’t want to be one of those people promising you snake oil or making you feel invisible if your anxiety proves to be way more stubborn than my own challenges have been.

So, with that caveat, here’s an update on where I’m at, how I did it, and what I can suggest for other people who are struggling too.

The Recap

Last October, I started having panic attacks. Debilitating ones, that were really getting in the way of my work and my life. While I had experienced perhaps a half dozen panic attacks while living in an RV and traveling the US, I was otherwise completely new to them. And when I’d had them, they hadn’t gotten in the way of my work or my life – I knew what triggered them, and within a few hours, I’d been able to move on from them.

But last fall was different. My husband was really worried. I was really worried too; as the current primary breadwinner in our relationship, and with a husband who was a full-time student, what if I couldn’t pay our bills? So I was having panic attacks and I was spiraling further, getting anxious about having anxiety, which I’ve since read is a sign of an anxiety disorder rather than simply anxiety (which everyone has on some level, and which is 100% normal, to my totally not clinical but still very educated on anxiety understanding).

On one particularly bad day, after a series of particularly bad days, I wanted to go to the mental health clinic. But, of course, I was anxious to go. I didn’t know what to expect. I didn’t quite believe they’d let me in, especially because I hadn’t received my health card yet (which is your ticket to free health care as a Canadian resident).

My loving husband took me. He sat with me patiently in the car, and he came inside with me too. And the therapist I saw was so affirming, so understanding, and so encouraging as she got me on the list for free province-provided therapy. She even believed me and took notes when I told her I’d recently realized the ample supplies of nightshade vegetables I’d been filling my diet with were apparently a huge anxiety trigger (tomatoes, peppers, potatoes, and eggplant were filling my diet during this harvest season), based on my own Googled research.

This began more than six months of challenges as I waited, and waited, and waited to get that free therapy. Backing off the nightshade vegetables helped make the panic attacks less frequent (think 1-2 per week rather than daily), and I finally signed up online with my first therapist since college. She went from being okay for a few months, helping me to treat the anxiety, to being completely awful, around the same time I was seeing a very mediocre (at least for me) free therapist (finally) provided by the province.

Things Began Shifting

By the spring, a few things began shifting in my life:

  • I wrapped a contract with a client that had been having a negative effect on my mental health for a very long time, giving me space to begin healing from what I later realized was pretty intense burnout
  • The work I’d been doing on myself using the Enneagram was paying off, and I was seeing the benefits in my relationship with Ross, with my family and friends, and most importantly in my relationship with myself too
  • I found a new therapist who was NIGHT AND DAY from my previous experiences; she’s still supporting me, and I am grateful every day that I didn’t give up on finding the right person for me
  • The time I’d invested in finding community on PEI was bearing fruit; I had local friends and was doing meaningful work, collaborating in multiple music ensembles and enjoying the opportunity to lead one of them
  • I created an Enneagram group and had a really successful pilot program (my first group coaching program over several months)
  • I discovered the Positive Intelligence framework and became a major advocate for the benefits of mental fitness (and subsequently, I became a mental fitness trainer and incorporated the work into my coaching business)
  • I finally stepped outside of my comfort zone into an Anti-Anxiety program offered free to Islanders (called I CAN) and completed it successfully

According to my anxiety coach, my last panic attack was in late August. I know it was a combination of the techniques I had internalized by this point (learned in both I CAN and in my mental fitness studies) as well as some of the deeper personal development I had done. Having my therapist to cheer me on was especially helpful on the days I needed someone to vent to – whether you work with a therapist as well (always ideal) or just find a friend or hire a coach or accountability partner, that safe space was key.

I’ve now realized that I’ve been battling anxiety my entire life, or at least as far back as middle school. I also realize that if I had known then what I know now about mental fitness, I wouldn’t have needed to have the stress and overwhelm in my life. And I would have made healthier choices from a sage place rather than acting out of fear or to numb or distract myself.

What I Recommend

My own personal journey to get control of my anxiety was more long-winded than it needed to be, but there were also a lot of factors at stake. If I hadn’t been overwhelmed in my work, things might have played out differently, perhaps on a faster timetable. If I wasn’t so sensitive to nightshades, the panic attacks may have been less debilitating. But what I now realize is that the gift of my panic and anxiety struggles over the past year or more is that I now have direct experience I can use when coaching my clients. I can relate to them in ways I never could have five years back. What a gift!

Also, for those of you with access to some kind of free anxiety program, or one that’s very affordable for you, do consider it, if you’ve got the bandwidth for it. While I wasn’t learning many new things in mine, the daily practice and accountability (just like I use with my clients) helped me to finally finish integrating all the things people had taught me over the years. I CAN is a great option for Islanders. Find out what, if anything, is available for you.

If you want to sleep well at night, if you want a life with less stress and overwhelm, if you want the tools to find joy and peace and curiosity again, I’d love to introduce you to the mental fitness training we can do together. I have a few spots open in a small group program that will be starting up this January. I’m also developing a new program specifically with musicians in mind, and I’m planning future groups for a) for childfree people b) for men and c) for retirees.

If you’re intrigued, the easiest way for me to tell you more is for us to hop on a call so I can give you a tour of the program and a bit of coaching and some training to incorporate when you’re feeling anxious or fearful or angry or judgmental. I include a few of my favorite mindfulness techniques that you can actually use anywhere, at any time. It’s a free call, and if it intrigues you, I’m offering my programs on a sliding scale to make them as accessible as possible as we begin 2023.

I have such gratitude to be a coach and to be doing this life-changing work. Please reach out to learn more, and if you think this might resonate with a friend or a family member, please encourage them to do the same.

Take care, and be well.

You’re Not Alone (Acknowledging Anxiety)

| jamiefeinberg

Three weeks back, I did something I’d been wanting to do for many months – I started seeing a therapist.

If I had my way, we’d all have affordable (for us) access to a therapist. A good one, who listens and knows the types of therapy that would be most helpful for us. Someone who gives us a safe space to work through the crap in our minds and helps us sort out our stuff.

If you’re reading this and you’re feeling like you’re in a great place right now, I am thrilled for you! I can tell you that from what I’m seeing on my social media feeds and hearing about through news outlets, it sure seems like most of the world has moved on from COVID-19 and is getting back to “normal”, or close to it. And it that’s you, I’m thrilled for you, and I truly hope you’re enjoying every minute of freedom and “normalcy”.

But honestly, even though I am sick of wearing masks, and miss seeing people’s faces, and I miss eating out at a restaurant in the winter, I’m just not there yet. It feels too soon, to me, to return to normal.

Lifting a mask mandate is all well and good (for most) when there’s a mild variant on the loose. But what if a new, more dangerous variant catches us off guard? One contagious enough to spread under the radar, when we’re least expecting it?

I’d love to say I’m embracing the now and taking it day by day and not worrying about what might come next. But that wouldn’t be accurate.

So these are the kinds of thoughts that are on my mind. I’m carrying a lot of stress and anxiety around COVID. Like a lot of us are.

Add to that the stressors of getting settled in a new country and the pressures and fears of a world at war, not to mention the anger and frustration at seeing so many people’s rights being taken away in the US (including New Hampshire, where I grew up, and Florida, our adopted home state), and I’m even more thankful to have a therapist.

I’m not sharing this for praise, or for pity.

I want you to know you aren’t alone. I want you to know that whether you wear a mask or not, and whether you’re “moving on” or not, it’s okay to experience anxiety.

And I want you to know that it’s okay to have some days, some weeks, even some months or years, where you’re not okay. Where you’re going through the motions, or phoning it in. Maybe you’ve had to take some time off, or add a nap into your routine. Maybe you’re tired of saying no to social plans out of fear.

Wherever you are, I want to encourage you.

Reach out to loved ones. They’ll probably relate, maybe even more than you realize.

Get a therapist if you can, and if not, seek out a trusted mentor or spiritual leader, or find an online support group aligned with where you are. Look for sliding scale therapy or call the National Suicide Prevention Hotline, or many of the other free resouces that may exist in your country, state, or city.

I’ve been digging deeper into the Enneagram for the past several months, and that means I’m doing a lot of work on getting to myself – who I am, how I became that person, and how I can become an even healthier, better version of me.

I also rely on journaling, exercising, getting outside, and all of my other existing coping mechanisms for when things get tough or feel overwhelming.

Whatever method(s) you use, and wherever you’re at, I’m wishing you all the best. You’re not alone.

And if you’re reading this, you’re here now, and I’m so glad.

Thanks for reading, and take care.

P.S. I’d like to get a group together to read The Road Back To You and do some Enneagram explorations. No previous experience required, just a copy of the book. If this journey of self-reflection (in a group setting) appeals to you, please leave a comment and let me know!

______________________________

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  • Subscribe to our blog, as well as perhaps InSearchOfAScoop.com, and recommend our work to your friends and family.
  • Take music or theater lessons (group or private) from us, either in person or via Skype at TinyVillageMusic.com.