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
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.
In stressful situations, we tend to default to old habits and/or move into survival mode to keep ourselves safe. All of this is completely understandable.
Because we’ve all had different experiences, have different brains, differences, personalities and more, what one person does under stress can look quite different from someone else. It’s part of what makes us unique. But what isn’t unique is that we are all hardwired to do certain patterns of behavior under these circumstances.
In thinking about the state of the world right now, I’m especially aware of how dangerous traveling is for so many people right now. Perhaps you don’t feel safe traveling internationally (or at least, you don’t feel safe crossing the border to get back in). Perhaps you don’t feel safe going to the grocery store or even leaving your home.
The situations may be different, and the reasons may be different, but in any of these circumstances, the goal is for us to be able to stay calm under pressure. We want to know that we will be calm and in control of our actions, even if we are being interrogated or profiled or otherwise threatened.
So I want to talk a bit about what happens to us under pressure, and how we can strengthen our practices and our minds to help keep us safe (or at least increase the likelihood of a positive interaction) in future encounters.
Photo of blue sky and branches by Optical Chemist
I’m going to do so with compassion for others in challenging circumstances, to the best of my ability. I’m going to do so using the lens of the Enneagram and mental fitness. As usual, please keep in mind that I’m not a scientist or a therapist, and what I’m sharing are my own opinions based on my own experiences. If you want the technical scientific jargon, I probably won’t be going there, and I’m also not a lawyer or a therapist, so consult your own if possible and do your own homework and come to your own conclusions.
My personal belief is that we all have some sort of wise, wonderful being inside of us. Maybe you’d call it your soul, or your sage or your wise mind. This special being is there from the time we are born. As soon as we’re born, basically, we start having experiences in the real world. From the noises and feelings when we first leave the womb, to the ways our family of origin treats us, to the kind and the harsh and the horrible humans who cross our paths along the way, we are challenged.
As a result of these experiences, we start developing a personality. We pick up traits along the way. We find that we get positive reactions or are safer more frequently when we do certain things, so we lean into those more. In the language of Positive Intelligence, the mental fitness program I use in my training and coaching, we find that some of our skills and characteristics serve us well, so we do them more and more, eventually resulting in some “saboteur” behaviors. We might discover people-pleasing tendencies, or a hyper-achiever who tells us we must keep “doing” or we don’t have value. Maybe we develop restless or avoider or controlling saboteurs as ways of coping with the world.
In the language of the Enneagram, by the time we are adults, we’ve settled into a grab bag of personality traits that sometimes help us and sometimes hurt us, because we overly rely on them. They trap us. If we study the Enneagram, we’ll learn that there are other people in the world very similar to us, whose personality types are also aligned with ours, though our own individual circumstances and that underlying soul within us means we’re still all different people.
Whether we’re using the language of mental fitness or of the Enneagram, if we are privileged enough to begin working on ourselves, it begins with non-judgmental self-observation and a recognition that we’ve been holding so tightly to these personality traits and behaviors that they are no longer serving us. We recognize that if we want to become more of that beautiful soul, more of that lovely sage being, so wise and as we were created, we’ll need to let go of the grip that our personality holds on us.
And if we’re able to see this, whether it’s because we did a saboteur assessment or read a book or experienced a life-altering circumstance or something else entirely, then we’ll find ourselves asking the question: what’s next? How do I step out of these habitual patterns that I’ve been in for so long, that have me trapped in my own patterns of personality?
The answer, in a word? Presence.
When we are able to let go of the sabotaging thoughts and judgment of our own mind, and instead practice being in the present moment, it’s the first step toward our own self-actualization.
It sounds lofty, but if we are able to practice, day in and day out, being fully present where we are, whether that’s by getting outside in nature or fully savoring a meal or feeling the water on our hands, we are, step by step, loosening the grip of our personality and making it easier for the wisdom of our wise mind to make it to the surface.
You may be wondering what the heck this has to do with staying calm when we’re traveling. That’s fair!
But it has everything to do with it. If we practice grounding ourselves, using any tools of mindfulness, while letting go of judgment, we are increasing the likelihood that when we encounter a stressful situation, we will be able to hear the wisdom of our wise mind. We’ll increase the likelihood that we will know how to best take care of ourselves in that situation. We become calmer, and wiser, and less anxious. Our wise mind will recognize whether we need to go hide, or explore a solution, or fight back, or simply have the words to answer a question calmly and in the wisest way possible.
We don’t usually learn to do this work. We are rarely, if ever, taught these skills in school. We are not taught that our mental muscles need to be strengthened and exercised just as much as our physical muscles do.
If you’re curious about this, I’m pleased to offer a Saboteur Assessment, without cost, to anyone interested in learning more about how they’ve been getting in their own way. Whether or not you choose to work with me in the future, I’d love to help you gain the understanding to move forward in the world without being held back by your own patterns of personality.
I can’t control what happens to you when you travel. But I’d love to empower you with the tools to control as much as you CAN control in your life.
Feel yourself wherever you are. Whether you’re standing, sitting, lying down, feel yourself on the surface you’re on. Touch an object (maybe try this device?) and observe the temperature and texture of it. Notice fine details you haven’t noticed before.
We are still here, friend. Let’s celebrate the little wins. You made it to today.
Photo of a monarch butterfly on a branch by Erik Karits
As much as there continues to be more horrendous news, I am seeing signs of progress regularly this week in the fight toward defending human rights and preventing more atrocities. Read on for more of the progress I am seeing ( in the United States, predominantly), if that interests you. And if not; go find some joy, and keep breathing! You’ve got this.
More signs of progress:
The unelected billionaire seems to be displeasing the Rump – or at least, seems to be leaving the prominent position he’s in. While I don’t trust any of that being simply face value, I am happy for signs of tension in that relationship. Cautiously optimistic, I’d say.
A great win in the courts in Montana this week for transgender and intersex (and any gender-noncomforming folks who might also be persecuted) folks in Montana. Their extreme bathroom bill was struck down!
Wisconsin’s election was NOT bought by Elon. His $25 Million could have gone so far, but instead he threw it at a candidate who was resoundingly defeated.
And while Florida’s election for two house seats was still easily won by Republicans, it was a MUCH lower margin than in November. Progress.
I’m also hearing more and more horror stories making headlines about visas being revoked. So while it’s disgusting that students and professionals alike are being deported or told to self-deport due to having an opinion the government doesn’t like, I’m heartened by how much people are talking about it and making noise about it to their reps.
And of course, I have to shout out Cory Booker, who spoke on the floor for more than 25 hours to make “good trouble” and make sure we know and understand that this administration is NOT normal and it’s NOT okay.
As I walked outside today before writing this, I enjoyed a gorgeous blue sky. I’ve recently booked another speaking gig and gotten myself a new part-time job I am thrilled about in addition to the beautiful mental fitness, coaching and Enneagram work I am privileged to share with the world.
I hope that whatever your own situation is, you’re finding signs of progress too. And if you have one, please consider sharing it with me!
Take care, and keep fighting the good fight. And remember, rest is resistance. Find joy. Be love. One step, and one day, at a time.
Curious about working with me? Want to learn more about what’s keeping you stressed or stuck? Book a saboteur assessment here, or learn more about the Enneagram here.
In the world we’re living in, with politics and climate change and humanitarian crises filling our brains and our neighborhoods and our news feeds, I could not be more grateful to be nearly three years into my mental fitness training. What began as a curiosity after six months of intense work to reign in my growing anxiety turned out to be the missing tool in my client work and in my own mental health, and I couldn’t be more thankful for it – especially right now. Today I’d like to share how I found mental fitness and the difference it’s made in my life.
Photo of a person with a cloth headband and simple dress with their back turned to the camera, looking out at a beautiful nature scene by Anastasia Shuraeva
Until my mid-thirties, I didn’t believe I suffered from anxiety. While I was diagnosed with and treated for “depression” as a busy early teen who’d started falling asleep in her classes and after school (in part due to the side effects from my allergy medication), I did talk therapy for a year and was told I was fine, basically, and the sessions stopped, because I was no longer falling asleep all the time and seemed functional and able to handle my activities again.
My life up until that point involved a major identification with the word “busy”. When asked how I was doing, I said I was busy. I was in multiple theater productions (my record was three at a time), taking piano lessons, starting clubs and singing in choirs. I stopped dance lessons mid-way through eighth grade as my theater passion took over (and I’d recently given up dance competitions, which is another article unto itself), but I had added voice lessons into the mix by high school and was also required to participate in three sports or athletic programs each year at the private day school I attended.
So yes. I was busy. And this identification with the word “busy” continued through high school, into college, and into my twenties, where any feelings I had of overwhelm or extra adrenaline or a racing heart etc. were labeled as “busy” at best and otherwise ignored. And when my body started showing signs of chronic health conditions, I pursued diagnoses for physical conditions without recognizing that there might be mental conditions worth exploring too.
It wasn’t until I figured out how to support my husband’s dream (traveling as a touring musician) by having the two of us buy a used RV and travel the United States that things started to shift. I relied on adrenaline and discipline and problem-solving to get through the transition, even in the face of my newer symptoms of fatigue, but by the time we’d been on the road for six months or so, things began to shift. Without a theater company to run, with minimal lessons to teach and nowhere to physically be (unless we wanted to), my mind began to open up, and I found myself asking questions I hadn’t really delved into deeply and from a wise state of mind before.
The questions looked something like these:
Why have I been so successful as a creative, and yet I’ve never earned more than $50,000 in a year?
What are my beliefs around money? Around success?
Where do I want to be in ten years? In twenty?
Who am I if I’m living a simpler life?
What does community mean to me?
Who are really my friends? Who are the friends who believe in me, even when I don’t have anything to offer them but my friendship?
As I began pursuing personal development for the first time, through programs and books and podcasts and an accountability group, I also was living with my husband in very close quarters on a daily basis for the first time. As he worked through his own mental health challenges, I started to see signs that I may also be living with anxiety for the first time. I began occasionally getting panic attacks – and they’d be triggered by my husband’s own struggles to regulate. I began to see with clarity my own signs of codependency and my struggles to maintain boundaries and protect myself from taking on other people’s emotions.
In the midst of these studies, COVID hit, and as Ross and I were prepping for a move to Canada in light of the uncertain political situation and fears that we wouldn’t be able to maintain a unique lifestyle that we loved if we lost our rights to affordable health care and control of our own bodies, we learned to work through new fears and anxieties for the future.
My body and mind were incredible to me during this time. I was working more hours than ever in my online businesses at the same time that I was overseeing a move to Canada, which felt like a fulltime job in itself.
Is it any wonder that by the time we got settled into our new Canada apartment, maybe two months in, my anxiety kicked into overdrive?
I finally felt safe, settled, and like I could relax. We’d gotten what we’d worked so hard for. We’d even crossed the border when such travel was still very restricted, especially on Prince Edward Island. And with this sense of safety and calm, my body said, ‘FINALLY!”. My anxiety rose to the top and spilled out all over the place. It was something like the way athletes get sick after the big competition or students and teachers get sick on vacation.
I was having several anxiety attacks a week. Driving became especially triggering. It was when I noticed it was starting to get in the way of my work that I sought professional help. I went to a mental health clinic and got on the list to see a psychologist. I signed up for Betterhelp to have a more affordable option than the going rate, and I went through one mediocre therapist on that platform before finding someone who had a lot to offer me. After several months on the wait list, I saw an in-person psychologist on PEI’s dime, who unfortunately didn’t seem capable of helping someone as high-performing as me. (She didn’t know what to do with me. Sound familiar to anyone else?) I completed a local anti-anxiety program called ICAN, which gave me excellent practice with anti-anxiety tools like body scans, 5 4 3 2 1, breaking anxiety-producing tasks into smaller pieces and many more.
In other words, I had a ton of support, which I’m grateful for. And I am sure it all helped, especially the anti-anxiety program, to get me through the worst of it. As I did the work, I started to observe myself going weeks and eventually even months between panic attacks.
And then, thanks to a fellow life coach, I discovered Positive Intelligence.
I took advantage of a free program for active coaches. Seven or so weeks of training in mental fitness, led by coach Shirzad Chamine and based on the most cutting edge science and research. We were required to maintain an accountability group and do daily check-ins with each other as part of the process, in addition to weekly group meetings over Zoom.
I entered the program skeptical that anything free could be that transformative. But I was soon a convert. My husband noticed differences in me too. When it ended, I knew I was signing up for further study and to begin training so I could bring mental fitness into my coaching practice.
There’s a lot about Positive Intelligence that resembles the personality study I’d been doing using the Enneagram since 2019. But there are a lot of distinctions too. While my Enneagram work had shown a brilliant light on where I was trapped in patterns of behavior, I hadn’t made significant progress in improving that behavior and growing toward a healthier way of being. (I had, however, developed a lot of compassion and understanding of how to be in better relationship with my family and friends and my husband – some major wins!)
With my new mental fitness tools and a daily commitment to practicing them (thanks in part to the genius Positive Intelligence app included in my study), things started to improve for me really quickly.
I became calmer in the face of stress. I became less likely to get triggered by my husband or a family member or a member of my chorus. I became better able to tap into a wiser, bird’s eye view perspective of my life. I became happier, more easygoing, and a more effective coach, partner, friend and family member.
And over and over again, my clients who chose to study mental fitness with me also were reaping the benefits. They became less reactive, more able to handle grief, better able to get things done (from creating and living by a budget to making phone calls or regulating their own anger and anxiety).
For me, and for so many in my work, mental fitness has been the missing piece. Instead of continually watching themselves repeating patterns but struggling to break free of them, they were able to be more effective and efficient, spending more time in that wiser part of their brain and quieting the negative and sabotaging parts of it. They were happier. And they got to benefit from a more healthy and regulated coach better able to guide them.
With hindsight, I can see that the big piece missing in my own Enneagram studies in the first several years was a commitment to a contemplative practice. At most, I’d dabbled in meditation, and while I went through periods where I got out in nature daily while we were RVing (often for hours at a time), I didn’t recognize it for the meditation that it was, or that it could have been, if I’d taken the podcast out of my ears and really tuned in to my surroundings. Until I joined Enneagram trainings and workshops (rather than simply reading books or listening to podcasts), I wasn’t clear on how essential it is to pair Enneagram work with meditation and other tools. By the time I began doing that that, thankfully, I’d incorporated Positive Intelligence into my life. All of sudden, I was growing mental muscles. My mental fitness and Enneagram work began to support each other.
I remember a few years back, sharing with delight an incident from earlier in the week with my first Enneagram cohort.
At the time, I had a plastic bin next to my bed, and on it, I had a humidifier. I also had a variety of different possessions, including a book, as I was using the bin as a night stand. On this particular evening, I’d fallen asleep and reached over to grab something, and I hit water. Everywhere. Everything on the stand was soaked.
Prior to my Enneagram or mental fitness studies, I would have been hit with a wave of self-revulsion for having made this mistake. My inner critic would have kicked into high gear. And then I would have been angry, jumping into action without stopping to think and cleaning all of it up myself. If at some point down the line I had thought to ask my husband (who was still wide awake) for help, I would have done so in an angry, frustrated state. When met with that heightened, angry and panicked state, my husband would have responded with his own saboteurs, and I know from past experiences this would have led to us both triggering each other and lengthening the process until we could each calm down, forgive as needed, and come to bed and fall asleep.
Instead, I felt the water, realized I was very close to sleep and didn’t want to wake up and ruin that, so I called out to my husband.
“Ross, can you help me with something?” I calmly asked. He came in, happy to assist, be helpful, and answer my calm request. I explained the situation and asked if he could help me since I was almost asleep. He agreed. Given that he struggles in those moments to know what to do, I then began making requests. “Can you go get a towel please?” “Can you put this over there?” I talked him through it, but did so calmly, lying in bed, and trusting him to figure out details of where to hang towels or set items to try.
And when all that was done, I simply rolled over and went back to sleep.
Nowadays, even in the face of this wild rollercoaster of a world, I am extremely grateful. For calm. For days where I am seldom, if ever, thrown off. Even in the face of hard things, it’s the rare day when I have to work hard to stay regulated. I’m able to preemptively do my mental fitness exercises long before a panic attack. And I am healthier, kinder, and more whole in my responses to the world.
Do you have a mental fitness practice? Want to learn more about the saboteurs that are keeping you from living your best life, day in and day out? Imagine what’s possible for you in your relationships, your career, and across your life with this change! It’s never too late to find more joy in your life.
This week in my inbox, Ruth Schalkhauser Tower of Inner Sky Living shared a reflection on leaving room for alternate positive realities. She reflected on how much energy she and her family put into negotiating a change in situation for her mom, only to find out, after much worry and planning on their part about how she’d take it, that mom was already thrilled about the upcoming change in circumstance.
Can you relate to that? Have you ever started making phone calls or gone on an endless anxiety loop, forecasting potential outcomes from something you are really upset about, only for it to turn out to not really be a big deal at all? Or, in fact, maybe it ended up being the best thing that ever happened to you!
Maybe it was a job you didn’t get, or a job you lost.
Maybe it was the relationship you tried so hard to save, but it was that relationship ending that led you to your current partner, or a career change, or to meeting your best friend.
Maybe not being able to come up with the money to buy the house or start the business or go to the school ended up being a gift in disguise.
I love this concept, and particularly her phrase of “alternate positive realities”. It reminds me of a term we use frequently in my mental fitness work: the sage perspective.
The sage perspective, in essence, says “who knows what is good, or what is bad?” The sage perspective says that if we are open to it, we may actually find that something we perceive as a negative now could be a net positive for us, or it could at least have positives in addition to the negatives. It doesn’t deny the negative consequences of what happened, but it asks us to consider the possibility that there may be positives from it that we may not see yet.
One way that I find makes it easier, at least when I’ve done my mindfulness exercises and gotten myself into my sage, wise part of my mind, to deal with fear and anger and sadness and discomfort from news headlines or other life stuff is to remember that I can hold space for the positive possibilities.
Perhaps this awful thing will cause people to see so-and-so for who they truly are.
Perhaps this will inspire bigger and bolder action that is transformative, positively, in the long run.
Similarly, perhaps this stressful or challenging task I have to do is preparing me to be more resilient and better able to handle future challenges down the line.
When we create space for positive possibilities, we don’t erase hurtful or problematic or even evil behaviors. But we can create space for finding the good. As Mr. Rogers used to say, we can look for the helpers.
P.S. Want to learn more about the sage perspective? Book your saboteur assessment feedback session here.
Photo of an elderly man staring at the sea through bars by Muhahmadhu Areesh
This week has been busy, and honestly, this year so far has been too. I’m feeling myself simultaneously caught up in the energy of a new year, all the feelings of possibility (real or imagined) that that entails, while also facing a particular brand of challenge and potential stress that has historically been a major issue for me.
I have so much to be grateful for, to be clear. In addition to the majority of areas of my life feeling fairly secure and in a beautiful place, I’m well aware of the privileges I have in even being able to make these plans and work on these types of challenges, when so many nearby and around the world are worried about the essentials – am I safe? Do I have a place to sleep tonight? Is there food on the table? Is there a table? Are my loved ones okay?
But as you may relate to, it’s still quite easy to get caught up in your own challenges, even when they’re not as challenging as someone else’s.
One of the things I’ve been working on this week, because of this particular “challenge” I referred to above, is on two things, as I described in my Enneagram Book Club meeting last night.
The first thing is that I’m working to keep my attention on all the good stuff, the majority of the time. Focus on gratitude for all the stuff that’s pretty darn awesome in my life and even in the lives of others. I have so much to be grateful for, in so many areas. And while there are times when I get troubling news or am handed a surprise and need to spend some time processing my emotions, most of the time in my day to day, I get to choose where my focus is. And if I choose joy (as I have often spoken of), it’s likely that my day, and the day of those I encounter, will be better because of it.
The second, complementary thing I am working on right now, is being able to work on the “challenge”, the hard thing, without bringing negative emotions into it. This is something that my Enneagram work helps me with, but I think it’s my mental fitness practice, more than anything, that has me in a great mindset for this. Instead of anxiety about the outcome of what I’m doing, or anger at the situation I am facing, I’m exploring what it feels like to be curious and to just get stuff done. Can I set aside the critical and sabotaging voices in my head when they pop up, and instead return to the next task at hand? Can I marvel at my ability to get things done in a crisis instead of wasting my energy getting upset? Can I trust that the better use of that energy is in the doing?
Part of this, for me, is that I need to get comfortable being uncomfortable. I don’t like the uncertainty and lack of control I’m feeling about this situation right now. But when I’m honest with myself, I’ve never been a fan of change, and I really like to feel in control. And control is an illusion, my friends. So I’m working on embracing liminality and thanking the universe for a chance to get uncomfortable and learn more. To learn to work productively through discomfort, without adding drama.
One of the things my mental fitness work has taught me is that the wise part of my brain can be in “go mode”, or exploring options, or creating new solutions, without any negative emotions in the picture. And when I take that approach, what could feel daunting or overwhelming can instead feel more like I’m a little kid on a playground, making a sandcastle or peeking behind a tree or creating a new club for my friends to join.
So if you’re also in the midst of a big “challenge”, whatever that may be, I want to encourage you. It’s okay to be uncomfortable and in transition. Those spaces offer us beautiful opportunities for growth, if we choose to see them that way. (And it’s okay if it takes time to get there.).
Though you may not be able to change the situation, consider if a shift in focus, to a wiser part of you, might bring you some peace, or at least help you work more efficiently so you can sooner take a break with some tea or get a hug from a friend.
I’m grateful for mindfulness practices and self-awareness cultivated with the Enneagram that are making all of this feel more attainable.
I’m also grateful for the opportunity of a new year, where we can keep reevaluating who we are and our place in the world.
Thanks for reading, and have a beautiful week!
P.S. A great practice for the new year could be to book a Saboteur Assessment to help you shine a light on what’s keeping you from your best work and being your most authentic self. You can also reach out to me to join my next Enneagram study, using Suzanne Stabile’s incredible curriculum, so that you can learn more about yourself in the company of like-minded people.
I’ll be honest. Some years, I feel super inspired to reflect on the year that’s passed and plan ahead with some goals and perhaps a word of the year for the year to come. But this is one of those years where I haven’t really been feeling it.
I think it’s because I’m tired. I’ve been focusing on resting and healing as much as I can lately after a very busy holiday season wrapped up, with a total of 8 performances (plus countless rehearsals) for various musical organizations I’m a part of in some form.
While this hasn’t looked like lounging on the couch much, it has seen me organizing my apartment and enjoying the process of decorating or decluttering. And yes, that kind of external work can be healing for my inner mind as well, though I know that isn’t true for every personality out there.
So here we are, New Year’s Day, and while I had been considering skippingb a post until I felt inspired, last night I felt myself interested in doing some reflection for myself (finally!), and I figured if I’m going to do it for myself, I might as well share some of my process with you. Perhaps it will be the inspiration you have been looking for – and if not, perhaps you’ll find something else useful to take from it.
For the past many years, nearly seven, I met weekly (or so) with a marvelous group of humans I met in an accountability group online. One of my favorite practices with this group was reflecting on the year that had passed and making plans for the future.
I’m going to teach about this process live today in my Facebook group, Crafting Your Life Adventure, but if you want to walk through it on your own, here are the highlights:
Using meditation, music, or your other favorite tools, tune into your body and clear your mind to set the table for reflection, without judgment or criticism of yourself. The goal is observation and celebration, and to let the wise part of you drive the bus.
In a journal or another safe and accessible space, list all the things you accomplished this year. Consider all the areas of your life, such as family, friends, career, home, personal goals, hobbies, spirituality, physical health, emotional health, new habits, even media or books consumed. Accomplishments don’t need to be physical, and they don’t need to be “measurable” in the traditional sense. Did you make any new friends? Did you survive another year? Did you do something you were afraid of? It can be helpful to ask a loved one we trust to help us do this with compassion if we struggle to recognize our own value or remember our own accomplishments.
Review any past lists of goals you’d set for this past year, and with gentle observation and no judgment, observe any progress you made toward those goals. If you didn’t get there, what obstacles did you hit? What lessons did you learn along the way?
Consider what you’d like to accomplish in the upcoming year. Sometimes, before I do this step, I dream up where I want to be in five years, or ten years. And that can help me get attuned to steps I want or need to take in the next year to make that happen.
As you dream up your next year of goals, again consider all areas of your life. Make sure you are tuning into YOUR goals, not society’s goals. If you don’t care about losing weight, why would you focus there? If you like renting instead of owning a home, awesome! Choose goals that are meaningful for you, with your own priorities in mind. Again, keeping sight of your goals for the future can help you here.
Consider if there’s a word that will sum up the spirit of the year you’re envisioning for yourself. Past words for me have included “Trust” and “Abundance”. Elizabeth Ryder does a lovely job of explaining how and why we might choose a word for the upcoming year. (And remember, you can always change your mind! It’s just a tool to help you remember your own goals in the busy world we so often get caught up.)
Consider working with a coach or reaching out to a friend for support if you want further clarity or a mirror for your own goals.
Consider finding a friend, coach, or joining a group for accountability in the coming year. (I lead several groups in this vein, and the new year is a great time to find one. Contact me to learn more.)
Want to start the new year off on a new foot? Why not schedule a Saboteur Assessment to learn more about what keeps you from your goals to help you feel more joy and become more effective in the new year?
When you feel complete in this process, find a way to let go of the past year and welcome the new year. It could be with a prayer or intention, a lighting of a candle and blowing it out at completion, or repeating an affirmation. A great thing to do is to end your reflection and goal-setting with gratitude for what was and for the lessons that came from it.
It’s never too late to do this type of work. Do you have a reflective practice at year end? Do you have goals for the upcoming year? I’d love to hear about it! You can comment or share with me in my Facebook group.
Congratulations on getting through this year. I’m very proud of you. I hope you are too. Wishing you all the best in the year to come.
P.S. I still have space for a few more participants interested in learning more about themselves and the patterns of their personality (and how to break free of them) using the Enneagram. Reach out to sign up, or join me for an intro!
Photo credit: photo of an evening with moon, tree, and water reflection by Pixabay.
I’m looking out the window as the snow comes down, at what looks like quite a vigorous pace, outside. I’m snuggled on my coach, laptop in my lap, cat snuggled under her blanket tent at my feet. I am getting work done in my business, fielding good news, looking forward to an Enneagram meeting where I know I’ll leave a little lighter and a little wiser than before. Life is good.
And yet….
I could just as easily write a different paragraph right now. Something like this:
I’m looking out the window as the snow comes down, at what looks like quite a vigorous pace, outside. I drink water frequently to keep from coughing from this post-viral loveliness that doesn’t want to leave me. The chill in the air and the lack of sunlight is depressing. And I look ahead to a meeting this evening, one I am looking forward to, but dreading the drive outside.
Some of us are extremely in touch with our emotions, but for most of us, I think there’s a spectrum. From those who never stop to consider emotions (theirs or others) to those who have tons of them, easily accessible at all times. I think I’m somewhere in the middle. Though I’m very in touch with how my body is feeling, I have to stop to contemplate where my emotions are at, most of the time, unless I’m just caught up in joy, or in rage (thankfully that one isn’t as frequent as it used to be!).
People can tell you to “think positive”. That’s usually pretty simplistic and dismissive, in my experience.
I prefer to choose joy. I can enjoy the wonder of a snowfall from under a warm blanket, with a snuggly cat. I can focus my attention on the positives I’m experiencing and on moments I am truly looking forward to, rather than focusing my energy on the negatives or on dwelling on potential negative outcomes in an anxiety spiral.
I can fear the unknown in the United States and around the world. Or I can celebrate the positive steps I took to make a difference this week, from sharing advice and lending an ear to reaching out to my senator to ask him to say no to the bill eliminating the Department of Education, and signing a petition against confirming a problematic politician.
I can focus on the uncertainties of self-employment, or rejoice in how freeing it was checking a bank account and seeing passive income from Black Friday purchases of my husband’s Play the Ukulele! course.
There’s no right or wrong here. And it’s so easy to see negative, and to get caught in dualistic thinking. But life is truly both/and. It’s scary and it’s beautiful. There’s love and there’s fear. Where will you focus today?
P.S. I’ve gotten much better at navigating, learning from, and simply recognizing my emotions since I started studying the Enneagram. I shared more about how to work with me, using the Enneagram or otherwise, last week.
One of my favorite reads this year has been The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture by Gabor Mate. It’s a long book, and I’m still working my way through it, but it’s the most comprehensive acknowledgement I’ve found of the complex factors that make our lives challenging as well as the varied ways, from individual to systemic, that healing is possible for us.
In the book, Mate refers to the concept of healing as a journey toward wholeness:
“It is a direction, not a destination; a line on a map, not a dot. Nor is healing synonymous with self-improvement. Closer to the mark would be to say it is self-retrieval.”
Self-retrieval.
What if we could find ourselves again? What if we could work through the suffering, make some changes, change our perspective, and ultimately return to ourselves?
To the beautiful self we were before the world hardened us, changed us, wounded us?
To the wise, sage being underneath all those layers of personality we put on as self-protection?
To the sweet, kind human obscured by our saboteurs and our sabotaging thoughts?
What would a journey of self-retrieval look like?
Conventional thoughts around healing might make us focus on the physical path toward healing: get some rest, take some medicine, eat some healthy food, get some exercise or movement into our day.
But if we’re on a journey of self-retrieval, that kind of healing would also include our mental and emotional needs. Maybe that’s therapy, spiritual development, coaching or yoga. Maybe it’s art-making or finding joy, fostering meaningful friendships and connections or joining support groups. Maybe it’s an afternoon with tea and a journal, or pounding a pillow, or grieving the loss of a loved one or an opportunity or a career that could have been.
One of my coaches emphasizes the importance of play – finding joy in the things we once did as children, or the things we wish we’d have had the opportunity to do as a kid. So for me, self-retrieval might mean cultivating play: purchasing a jump rope, swinging on a swing, coloring in a coloring book, or dancing around my living room or in a dance studio.
What does healing as self-retrieval mean to you?
My Enneagram teacher, Suzanne Stabile, has a book called The Journey Toward Wholeness. I recently re-read it with a cohort of other students of the Enneagram. The conversations have been revelatory. The Enneagram remains my favorite tool for self-retrieval or healing.
It’s so easy, amidst a busy day and week and life, to stick to the status quo and say no to new opportunities. But as Suzanne says in her book, “Even when there is much to do, we must first guard our souls.” I highly recommend joining an Enneagram cohort (my next one will start in the new year) or, if you know your number, a group like my Enneagram Book Club, to further your own work toward self-retrieval.
Do you agree with Gabor Mate, that healing can be seen as self-retrieval? Does this have any implications for you in your own journey?
If you’re feeling a lot of emotions or going through changes in your life, now might actually be the best time for you to seek a community as you navigate your healing journey. And wherever you are in the journey, I wish you all the best.
Crafting The Life You Want: A Practice in Living 