Why So Serious?

I’ve had a number of potential topics for this blog post lined up for some time, most of which are directly related to our experience of surviving this pandemic including decision making, trauma vs. resilience, etc. These are great (and important!) topics that I will eventually get to, but when I stop to think about what I need more than anything right now it has nothing to do with the seriousness of this situation. In fact, in recent weeks I’ve found myself drawn to things that are distinctly NOT serious. For anyone who knows me, including those of you who have been in treatment with me, you know that humor is a big part of who I am. I was voted class clown in high school and I wrote my doctoral dissertation on the use of humor is psychotherapy. So, alas, today I will write about not taking things, including yourself, too seriously. To be clear, I don’t intend whatsoever to downplay the seriousness of this pandemic. The number of lives lost and the amount of suffering endured is sobering. Rather, I intend to highlight a way of coping with this truly difficult year.

So what does it mean to take yourself too seriously? First, let me ask you this. What happens when you ask a child to draw you a picture? What if you ask him to dance? What if I asked you to draw a picture? To dance? Chances are there would be no hesitation whatsoever for the child to jump in and take action. For adults, however, the first step is to think about it…which quickly leads to OVER thinking it, which results in never doing it. Drawing and dancing are often cornerstones in the life of a child…not only are they regular activities but they’re FUN. Moreover, children don’t know enough about self consciousness to let it dictate their behavior so there is very little they’re not willing to try. For many adults, however, spontaneously drawing a picture is something they haven’t done for years, which triggers the part of their brain that tells them to be self conscious, to fear ridicule and then…BAM it’s all so serious and NOT FUN. 

Taking yourself too seriously has little to do with how silly you actually are or how much self respect you have, but more with how well you’re able to deal with the unexpected. In fact, you may find that you are able to be totally silly and spontaneous around those you love whose opinions of you could never trigger the fear of ridicule or rejection. But no matter how hard we try, we eventually feel the demands and responsibilities of adult life (especially in this remarkable year where there has been so much unexpectedness and uncertainty) our anxiety grows, we become less flexible and we seek control. Obviously it is important to be serious when attending to certain matters of life, but being too serious leads to a disruption in our emotional equilibrium and our internal world can become a dark, overly structured, rigid, micromanaging command center of negativity. Not taking yourself seriously, on the other hand, creates an internal world where you see and accept yourself at your most elemental—as an ever evolving human playing out an unfinished story. When you loosen up on yourself, you open up space for play, for exploration, and for change.

Now for the million dollar question, how do I stop taking myself so seriously??

Try to be who you are when you’re with your loved ones. Most of us are more vulnerable, forthcoming, and even absurd or strange when we’re with family and friends. We can transition seamlessly from cracking jokes to discussing the heaviness of the world and its politics. Try to stay in touch with that way of being with your closest people and challenge yourself cultivate a similar attitude with others. 

Create something unusual. Creating something without a goal in mind helps us let go of thinking about how things “should go.” Journaling with no audience in mind is a great way to practice this. Recently I bought some watercolor, paint markers and luxurious watercolor paper…I’ve begun making small things without the fear of “wasting” the good paper or needing the results to be just right. It’s been so calming! So liberating! Create something before your mind has a chance to call out imperfections.

Take a break when you need to reset. Sometimes our minds get stuck in a seriousness loop because it’s a stressful day or there are too many things to manage at once. Take a minute to notice that you’re tense, feeling the need for control and take a few seconds to reboot. This can be as simple as getting a drink of water, or doing something physical like a couple of jumping jacks.

Add more humor to your life. Surround yourself with funny people. Turn off the news and violent shows; watch a comedy instead. In recent months I’ve had an ever deepening appreciation for those who I consider to be some of the true heroes of this pandemic…the folks at home creating hilarious content out of the absolutely unbelievable current events. From comedians like Sara Cooper to anonymous but FUNNY people the internet can be a treasure trove of humor if you’re looking in the right places. 

Ask yourself: “What’s the worst thing that could happen?” This simple question can help you, and others, put things in perspective. I’m not telling you not to aim high, but to find balance. Write everything that comes to your mind. Are you worried about real things? Or are you taking small things too seriously? Reflect and separate worries from facts. 

Confront the fear of being ridiculed. End the vicious cycle—fear fuels more fear. Face it and get over it. As Seth Godin said, “Dance with fear. As you dance, you realize that fear is, in fact, a compass—it’s giving you a hint that you are onto something.” Use that fear as energy to leap forward. Or, as Audre Lorde said, “the courage to feel is the antidote to fear” so allow yourself the courage to feel SILLY and see where your fear goes. 

“There is some passing acknowledgement of the bad old days, which, by the way, were not so bad as to have any ongoing effect on our present. The mettle that it takes to look away from the horror of our prison system, from police forces transformed into armies, from the long war against the black body, is not forged overnight. This is the practiced habit of jabbing out one’s eyes and forgetting the work of one’s hands. To acknowledge these horrors means turning away from the brightly rendered version of your country as it has always declared itself and turning toward something murkier and unknown. It is still too difficult for most Americans to do this. But that is your work. It must be, if only to preserve the sanctity of your mind.””

— Ta-Nehisi Coates

Virtual Therapy Sessions Available

Arrow Psychotherapy remains open for business and is offering all existing and new clients virtual sessions during San Francisco’s Public Health Shelter In Place Ordinance. The outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) may be stressful for people. Fear and anxiety about a disease can be overwhelming and cause strong emotions in adults and children. Coping with stress will make you, the people you care about, and your community stronger.

Stress during an infectious disease outbreak can include

• Fear and worry about your own health and the health of your loved ones

• Changes in sleep or eating patterns

• Difficulty sleeping or concentrating

• Worsening of chronic health problems

• Increased use of alcohol, tobacco, or other drugs

People with preexisting mental health conditions should continue with their treatment and be aware of new or worsening symptoms. People who are not currently engaged in treatment but are recognizing that their stress and anxiety levels are increasing should seek help.

Taking care of yourself, your friends, and your family can help you cope with stress. Helping others cope with their stress can also make your community stronger.

Things you can do to support yourself

• Take breaks from watching, reading, or listening to news stories, including social media. Hearing about the pandemic repeatedly can be upsetting.

• Take care of your body. Take deep breaths, stretch, or meditate. Try to eat healthy, well-balanced meals, exercise regularly, get plenty of sleep, and avoid alcohol and drugs.

• Make time to unwind. Try to do some other activities you enjoy.

• Connect with others. Talk with people you trust about your concerns and how you are feeling.

Call your healthcare provider or schedule time to see a therapist if stress gets in the way of your daily activities for several days in a row. Arrow Psychotherapy is currently accepting new clients for virtual sessions, please click here if you’d like to schedule an initial session.

Why Negative Emotions are Actually a Good Thing

It turns out humans are just really, really bad at avoiding how they feel, yet it's still a wildly popular thing to do. Emotions tend to have a way of making themselves known in one way or another and, once they're apparent, it's hard to turn your attention away from them. It's like if I told you that you absolutely must not, under any circumstances, think of a banana. What will happen? Yup. Nothing but bananas.  This isn't such a bad thing when it's a positive emotion like excitement, anticipation, happiness or joy but it becomes tremendously problematic when the emotions are deeply uncomfortable or feel unacceptable. As distressing as some emotions can be they are, believe it or not, vital to our wellbeing.

Psychologist Jonathan M. Adler of the Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering says, "Acknowledging the complexity of life (e.g the good AND the bad) may be an especially fruitful path to psychological wellbeing" and argues that, just as we cannot help but think about a banana when told not to, attempting to suppress thoughts can backfire and even diminish our sense of contentment.

Some of the most compelling research on this idea comes from Dr. Steven Hayes, the creator of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) which teaches patients to accept unavoidable private events (e.g., thoughts, feelings) and to simply notice thoughts without judging them as true, false, bad or good. In this study, he found that using ACT with those suffering from severe and disturbing positive psychotic symptoms such as auditory and visual hallucinations, actually helped them cope with such symptoms enough to decrease rehospitalization!  Simply put, directly trying to make symptoms go away (i.e., ignoring our feelings) could produce paradoxical effects (i.e., make us think about them more OR make them more distressing). However, if we instead practice acceptance of those feelings, judge our thoughts less, and identify a valued action we can take about whatever is bothering us we may actually move through our problems more quickly. 

As much as we'd like to ignore the things that make us feel terrible, we experience negative emotion for a reason. As Adler says, "One of the primary reasons we have emotions in the first place is to help us evaluate our experiences." In fact, bad feelings can be a vital clue that a health issue, relationship, or other important matter needs attention and because of this, Adler argues, the survival value for negative emotions may explain why suppressing them is so fruitless. Fruitless, and often entirely beyond our control...even if you successfully avoid thinking about something, your subconscious may still dwell on it. For example, in a 2011 study psychologist Richard A. Bryant and his colleagues at the University of New South Wales in Sydney told some participants, but not others, to suppress an unwanted thought prior to sleep. Those who tried to muffle the thought reported dreaming about it more, a phenomenon called dream rebound. 

Not only are negative emotions biologically necessary in order to help us make sense of our experiences and act accordingly, but they also provide important context for appreciating the good things when they do happen: 

“I know that pain is the most important thing in the universes. Greater than survival, greater than love, greater even than the beauty it brings about. For without pain, there can be no pleasure. Without sadness, there can be no happiness. Without misery there can be no beauty. And without these, life is endless, hopeless, doomed and damned. 
Adult. You have become adult.” ―  Harlan Ellison, Paingod and Other Delusions

So what it comes down to is this: We often feel bad but it's not such a bad thing...as long as we allow ourselves to view our negative emotions as simply information about our current lives and perhaps to evaluate possible change that needs to occur. Start by noticing thoughts without judging them as true, false, bad or good. Instead of backing away from negative emotions, accept them. Acknowledge how you are feeling without rushing to change your emotional state and remind yourself that a thought is just a thought and a feeling just a feeling, nothing more.

 

A Time for Refusal: The Fight Against Evil

Evil takes many forms and has been a fixture in human existence from the dawn of time. The fight against evil can be personal in which one wrestles with demons of depression, anxiety, alcoholism, or some other such struggle or it can be a collective one in which entire societies fight against social injustices. Evil can be overt and it can be sneaky and, as so beautifully written in this New York Times article, "Evil settles into everyday life when people are unable or unwilling to recognize it. It makes its home among us when we are keen to minimize it or describe it as something else." 

Sexual violence, racism, torture, war crimes, bigotry and misogyny are all forms of evil that, as a society, we should not only outright reject but also collectively fight against. Sadly, however, in the events leading up to the election and certainly in atrocious acts like this, this or this following the election, this is the last thing that's happened. Certainly people are outraged but outrage, unless actually channeled into something active and productive, soon becomes its own form of complacency. The fight against evil has to be ongoing and has to be active. But what does that mean? What can we actually do to fight societal evil?

The safety pin movement is a symbolic act in the fight against this kind of evil and, while a powerful gesture, is largely passive. I have nothing against wearing a safety pin but that should not be all we do because, like unchanneled outrage, a safety pin is entirely ineffectual. The following guidelines from this article can help you put what the safety pin symbolizes into practice by supporting marginalized communities: 

1. Be intolerant of intolerance. We must make it clear that racism, discrimination and intolerance are no longer values that we as a society will hold. When you encounter these things address them head on even if simply by calling it out. 

2. Seek out marginalized voices and perspectives. The average American consumes massive amounts of media on a daily basis. But how many black, women, LGBTQ or Muslim authors do you read? Follow on twitter? How many podcasts do you listen to that provide a different viewpoint?  If this answer is not many, this is a problem even if its unintentional. The good news is this is an easy thing to change. 

3. Confront your racism and don't be fragile. This is probably one of the most difficult yet most important steps to take. It will be uncomfortable and you will come face to face with opinions that upset you, but don't tune out, don't disengage. Sitting with any difficult emotion is the crux of doing the work. 

4. Use your privilege to support marginalized movements. And resist the urge to feel like you are a leader...your job is to follow the leaders of the movement and do what you can to support them, even if you think you might know a better strategy.

5. Give your time and money. This is perhaps one of the most simple and straightforward ways of taking action. 

6. Be proactive about inclusion in your daily life.  The mistake a lot of White people make is to think that simply not discriminating is enough. You can do more, and do better, by taking proactive measures to invite people of color, immigrants, and other marginalized people into your space.

7. Avoid segregation. American culture tends in many ways to self-segregate. For whatever reason, White spaces tend to be very White, but that doesn't mean you can't do something to fight that tendency. 

8. Do the work to be inclusive. Keep up with what's happening in communities other than White communities, including the language people use with and about one another. 

The fight against evil can seem daunting and insurmountable but if we work together and look to our country's role models we can be powerful against all forms of evil. Take the words of President Obama on talking to his daughters after the election: 

“What I say to them is that people are complicated,” Obama told me. “Societies and cultures are really complicated … This is not mathematics; this is biology and chemistry. These are living organisms, and it’s messy. And your job as a citizen and as a decent human being is to constantly affirm and lift up and fight for treating people with kindness and respect and understanding. And you should anticipate that at any given moment there’s going to be flare-ups of bigotry that you may have to confront, or may be inside you and you have to vanquish. And it doesn’t stop … You don’t get into a fetal position about it. You don’t start worrying about apocalypse. You say, O.K., where are the places where I can push to keep it moving forward.”

Or, find inspiration in San Francisco's official response to the election of Trump. There is plenty of good in the world to overcome the evil, but we can't minimize the evil, we can't make excuses for it, and we certainly can't ignore it. We must refuse it. 

Hope in a Time of Grief

In the wake of the presidential election, it seems many San Franciscans are just trying to cope.  Therapists around town are being sought out to help process the feelings of disbelief, sadness, fear, and grief that many are feeling. Although the topic has been written about before, it seems important to touch upon again given the recent political events and to remind ourselves that grief does not just result from death of loved ones. People feel grief whenever there is a deep sense of loss...at the loss of relationships, the end of friendships, divorces, lost job opportunities, or even upon being diagnosed with a chronic health condition. With grief, there is a yearning for the past and a wish to escape the pain and uncertainty of the future.  Elizabeth Kubler Ross is the well-known author who described the universal stages of grieving.  The stages involve denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally, acceptance.  However, despite some universal characteristics, not everyone moves through grief in a linear way. Some people feel stuck and find themselves unable to move past their feelings of depression or anger following a loss. When this happens, they may describe being out of control of their feelings or numb or they might experience physical aches and pains or general difficulty functioning in the day to day.  

One path toward healing can come from a search for meaning and a sense of hope that a valuable life can still be lived, despite suffering great loss. One of the best examples of finding meaning against all odds can be found in Viktor Frankl's book, Man’s Search for Meaning. The book is a telling of Frankl's (a Viennese psychotherapist) experiences of surviving the Auschwitz concentration camp. In the book he describes terrible and inhumane conditions, yet imbues hope for survival despite the harshest of conditions. Frankl believes that meaning can be found, despite great suffering, in the everyday moments of daily life.  His approach encourages readers to, “nevertheless, say yes to life.” 

Frankl’s words can provide hope for those experiencing hopelessness. He wrote:

“everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”

In the throes of grief one might spend much energy bargaining to change or un-do the circumstances he or she is in.  However, as Frankl says, “it is not freedom from conditions, but it is freedom to take a stand toward the conditions.” It is this realization that often leads to change and a greater sense of control and even satisfaction in one’s life. 

So, in this time of great change and perhaps grief, take the steps necessary to move through your emotional reactions and, if possible, to transform them into something meaningful. Remember, too, that if you find yourself stuck you can always seek therapy because, as it turns out, it works! 

Life is Short

Here I am, on the eve of one of the most contentious and monumental presidential elections in history, writing a blog post about what's important. This is something that my work as a therapist always tries to keep in focus...what are our values? How do they drive our decision making and behavior? Are we doing what brings us joy? If not, why not? Sometimes we have the power to make changes that allow us to live a life more aligned with what's important to us, and sometimes things feel wildly out of control (like, say, this presidential election?!). This blog post does a beautiful job at articulating the need we most likely all have in eliminating "bullshit" from our lives...

“If you ask yourself what you spend your time on that’s bullshit, you probably already know the answer. Unnecessary meetings, pointless disputes, bureaucracy, posturing, dealing with other people’s mistakes, traffic jams, addictive but unrewarding pastimes. There are two ways this kind of thing gets into your life: it’s either forced on you or it tricks you. To some extent you have to put up with the bullshit forced on you by circumstances. You need to make money, and making money consists mostly of errands. But while some amount of bullshit is inevitably forced on you, the bullshit that sneaks into your life by tricking you is no one’s fault but your own. And yet the bullshit you choose may be harder to eliminate than the bullshit that’s forced on you. Things that lure you into wasting your time on them have to be really good at tricking you. ”

— Paul Graham

But it's not only about eliminating bullshit, but also trying to nurture what is meaningful to us. For some people this comes naturally and easily and for others this is a process that needs to be learned through experience and, often, mistakes. Some values are instilled in us from our family and others we choose for ourselves, but all values are in place to guide our behavior. They're helpful short cuts for us to make decisions whether or not we're even aware of their influence. As Paul Graham says in his blog, "One heuristic for distinguishing stuff that matters is to ask yourself whether you'll care about it in the future. Fake stuff that matters usually has a sharp peak of seeming to matter. That's how it tricks you. The area under the curve is small, but its shape jabs into your consciousness like a pin. The things that matter aren't necessarily the ones people would call 'important.' Having coffee with a friend matters. You won't feel later like that was a waste of time." 

Eliminating bullshit and fostering what's truly important to us is and should be a life long task and one that takes tremendous attention. But you can start by asking yourself this: "What matters to me most?" 

The Geography of Grief

As a therapist, I can't tell you the number of times I've had to give people permission to cry. Often people work incredibly hard to avoid crying at all costs and, when I comment on how it seems they really want to cry but are trying not to for some reason, the floodgates open yet they can't quite explain why they couldn't allow themselves to express their sadness, sorrow, or grief. Many often comment on how they "hate crying in front of others" or "are afraid if they allow the sadness to come they will not recover." As difficult as it is, I encourage them to cry, yell, moan or express whatever they may be keeping tightly sealed inside, but it often takes quite some time for them truly soften to those difficult emotions.

Grief as an emotion is most tightly linked with death, however, Francis Weller, MFT, a psychotherapist who specializes in the deep and difficult work of grief, says it comes in many forms and, when it is not expressed, it tends to harden the the once-vibrant parts of us. In this article Mr. Weller discusses how our culture views and deals with grief and different it is from other cultures, especially more traditional cultures. 

By and large, we are very averse to facing our most difficult emotions head on. We've been conditioned to think that expressing our pain is a sign of weakness and that vulnerability is inherently a bad thing (watch this to see otherwise!). As a result, we try to power through, ignore the feelings, and work extremely hard to stifle the tears and become calcified to the rich, messy, but ALIVE parts of ourselves. As Mr. Weller says, "In this culture we display a compulsive avoidance of difficult matters and an obsession with distraction. Because we cannot acknowledge our grief, we’re forced to stay on the surface of life. Poet Kahlil Gibran said, 'The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.' We experience little genuine joy in part because we avoid the depths." What's more, all this avoidance takes massive amounts of psychic and physical energy, which perpetuates the cycle of feeling run down, isolated and exhausted. 

So what's the alternative? To engage with grief/sadness/disappointment/depression/fear and to allow others to share it with you. To understand that whatever the struggle, it is something that provides us with important information about our lives, and enriches us despite how painful the process might be...as Mr. Weller beautifully states: "The work of the mature person is to carry grief in one hand and gratitude in the other and to be stretched large by them. How much sorrow can I hold? That’s how much gratitude I can give. If I carry only grief, I’ll bend toward cynicism and despair. If I have only gratitude, I’ll become saccharine and won’t develop much compassion for other people’s suffering. Grief keeps the heart fluid and soft, which helps make compassion possible."

Facebook vs “Real Life”: How Social Media Impacts Us

Facebook and other social media platforms are rife with potential research topics, both about their positive effects on our lives and about how they may be making us all a lot less happy. For example, a colleague of mine wrote her doctoral dissertation on how the social support from Facebook might be beneficial to Iraq War veterans…a potentially powerful and positive use of social networking. Yet, on the other hand, there have recently been a number of articles published about what posting selfies says about our personalities and mental wellbeing; Some say selfies indicate narcissism, other say they indicate shallow social relationships and still others say the tendency to post pictures of yourself is related to having low self worth. In any case, the fact remains that social media is now a part of our lives whether we like it or not and, because of this, it tends to be a topic that comes up in therapy quite a bit. In this blog post I’ll outline four ways that I see social media impacting our daily lives and relationships.

1. The Pressure to Be Interesting At All Times: After reading this article I’ve had Lorde’s song “Royals” in my head for days. I’m not necessarily a Lorde fan, but I do appreciate the lyrics to this particular song because it challenges the rampant attitude that we all need to be fabulous and do and own fabulous things in order for our lives to have any meaning. It’s not only that “every song's like gold teeth, grey goose, trippin' in the bathroom, blood stains, ball gowns, trashin' the hotel room” but Instagram feeds like Rich Kids of Instagram and even social bookmarking sites like Pinterest can make us feel as though we’re somehow failing miserably at life because we’re not interesting or creative enough. But you know what? Being just okay is just fine. In fact, maybe that’s all we should ever hope for! There’s nothing wrong with having goals and striving to be better, but accepting your life as it is just as important. (More on acceptance here)

2. The Preoccupation With How Our Lives Look To Others: This is somewhat related to number one in that perhaps the pressure to project an interesting or amazing image actually prevents us from enjoying our real life as it unfolds. I often think of an example a friend of mine shared with me about a woman whose son fell into a coi pond at the arboretum and she didn’t notice until she went to edit the Instagram photo she was taking at the time that happened to capture the event. Obviously this example is more of a safety issue than a concern that this woman wasn’t enjoying herself, but the behavior is the same: she was not present. Sometimes getting the picture of what you’re doing or who you’re with to post to Facebook, Instagram or Tumblr as “evidence” of how great things are in your life becomes more of a priority than actually engaging in the activity or spending time with the person. 

3. Comparison, Comparison, Comparison! If I had a dollar for every time someone shared with me how upset they get about seeing others’ success, beauty or happiness through social media…I would have a lot of dollars. While this is related to the pressure to be interesting, the tendency to compare ourselves to others is underscored by a different, more dangerous type of self loathing. We may be able to brush off the pressure to be something particular but, once comparisons start, we can quickly find ourselves in a very ugly downward spiral of insecurity. When comparing our lives to those we see on social media it’s easy to feel like we’re not thin enough, not beautiful enough, not smart enough, not successful enough and that we don’t have enough money. We somehow forget or disregard that what we see on Facebook is only what people share…and (except for the occasional over-sharer or doomsday poster—we all have them in our feeds) we usually only get the highlights of people’s lives, especially if they’ve fallen victim to numbers one and two. So, what we end up doing is comparing everyone else’s “highlight reels” to our own “behind the scenes” which, as they say, is like comparing apples to oranges. It’s different fruit. 

4. How Our Behavior Online Affects “Real Life” Relationships: Whether we like it or not, our behavior online affects our real life relationships and behaving badly online, so to speak, can be harmful. There are the very serious and extremely tragic examples of this when it comes to cyberbullying, and there are the never ending redactions and awkward apologies from celebrities and other public figures who take to twitter too quickly to make a statement only to realize that in their haste they were being atrociously disrespectful. In a way, the problem is twofold; First, there’s a tendency to forget that there are real people on the other end of these Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc. feeds and so we behave in a way we never would if we were with the same people face to face. Second, because there are no checks and balances (i.e., we don’t have the same repercussions to our behavior if we were face to face), and we are perhaps too caught up with numbers one, two and three…there tends to be an impulsiveness to our behavior online that gets us into trouble. 

Ideally, there should be some continuity between who we are in real life and how we present ourselves and behave online. However, our online presence is ultimately a step removed from who we really are. This can be extremely liberating at times (we can create an ideal version of our lives!) or it can be very sad and lonely, especially if the internet makes us feel like our lives are only valuable if they more closely resemble what we see online. This was a long post, but I feel like I could go on and on. There will likely be more to come about the intersection of our real lives and our internet lives so stay tuned!  

The Capacity To Be Alone

The first time I ever really thought about how important it is to not only tolerate being alone (which, is to say tolerate yourself) but also enjoy it was after reading this famous article by DW Winnicott. I was immediately drawn to the idea (and to Winnicott's theories!) and rather quickly decided that to develop and nurture the tolerance to be alone is to cultivate a stable and secure source of wellbeing. 

So what exactly is the capacity to be alone? Winnicott originally coined the term when referring to the development of individuality that starts with the infant’s ability to be alone in the presence of the mother. It is the child’s ability to move from the sense of the mother’s compassionate, comforting and loving presence, to his/her ability to hold on to her presence, even when alone. This internalized sense of the comforting mother develops into the psychological capacity to regulate anxiety, self-soothe, and experience a true authentic self. In essence, this is the capacity to be alone.

To have not at all, or even poorly, developed this capacity could have potentially detrimental effects on our relationship to ourselves and to others. The following Osho quote speaks to this: 

“The capacity to be alone is the capacity to love. It may look paradoxical to you, but it’s not. It is an existential truth: only those people who are capable of being alone are capable of love, of sharing, of going into the deepest core of another person—without possessing the other, without becoming dependent on the other, without reducing the other to a thing, and without becoming addicted to the other. They allow the other absolute freedom, because they know that if the other leaves, they will be as happy as they are now. Their happiness cannot be taken by the other, because it is not given by the other.
”

— Osho

True intimacy (which many, if not most, adults struggle with) starts with a comfort in your own sense of self.  If you like yourself and feel comfortable, you will be able to relate in a real and genuine way with another person. True intimacy is possible when you have the “capacity to be alone” because it implies choice. You may want to be with someone but you don’t have to be with someone because you fear that being alone leaves you without stability or value. If you are truly OK with being alone, you don't have to cling to someone to avoid abandonment or avoid someone for fear of rejection. 

So it's worth considering: Are you OK with being alone? And, in this day and age of hyperconnectivity, are we ever truly alone? I think, for now, I'll leave that for a different post about the effects of social media on our sense of selves. Stay tuned! 

Brain Training for Schizophrenia: Perhaps Others Could Benefit Too?

I just came across this article about recent developments in the treatment of schizophrenia. Schizophrenia is obviously a very severe and disturbing disorder both for those suffering from it and for those treating it. However, psychosis, like many things, falls on a spectrum and a disorder like schizophrenia is likely at the far end of the spectrum. But don't we all occasionally exhibit strange beliefs? Magical thinking? Difficulty screening what is salient from what is not (especially given the onslaught of digital information with which we're confronted every day!)? It seems to me that "brain training" could be a useful practice for all of us to have more successful and fulfilling lives...even if we don't suffer from hallucinations. One particular form of "brain training" is discussed in what's called Acceptance an Commitment Therapy (ACT) developed by Steven Hayes and (in its simplest form) teaches patients to accept unavoidable private events; to identify and focus on actions directed toward valued goals; and to defuse from odd cognition, just noticing thoughts rather than treating them as either true or false. This is proven to be a very powerful form of therapy for all kinds of people, but has also shown very robust results in helping those who suffer from psychotic disorders better manage their symptoms. So while not all of us fall on the far end of the psychotic spectrum, we most likely could all use some brain training to tune out distractions. 

Acceptance.

Acceptance, true acceptance, is something many of us struggle to achieve. It doesn't help that we are constantly barraged with messages reinforcing that we should not  accept so many things...don't like the television show? Change the channel. Don't like your body? Go on a diet or get a cosmetic procedure. Don't like your boss? Quit your job! Don't get me wrong...sometimes change is just the thing we need and it can keep us nimble and flexible and, ironically, better able to accept challenges (after all, the only constant in life is change, right??).

However, the problem comes when, because we grow so used to changing the things we don't like (e.g., avoiding the real problem), we feel deeply and perpetually unsatisfied with what we ultimately cannot change. In human psychology the definition of acceptance is "a person's assent to the reality of a situation, recognizing a process or condition (often a negative or uncomfortable situation) without attempting to change it or protest it." Great! Sign me up! How do I accept negative and uncomfortable situations? Well, like most things, acceptance starts with practice and takes time to develop, but the following strategies can help you get a good start:

1) Adopt a "Yes, But" Attitude

This is actually something that comes up for so many of my clients while discussing acceptance. So often people say, "But I came to therapy to change!" and they find the mere suggestion to consider acceptance frustrating. Therapy is absolutely about change, but it is just as much about identifying and growing more comfortable with our limitations. By adopting a "yes, but"  (e.g. "Yes I am unhappy at work, but I just started this job a month ago and perhaps I should give it some more time) attitude, we can both accept where we currently are while also allowing for the possibility of change.

2) Talk About It

The better we understand our discomforts, anxieties and fears, the easier it is to accept them. Talking about these things normalizes them, and helps us feel more comfortable with them. 

3) Ask Questions & Create Meaning 

Some good questions to start with might be, "Why do I want to change this so badly?" "What is the worst case scenario if I have to deal with this for the rest of my life?" "Do I want to change this for me or for someone else?" "What do I imagine my life will be like if this changes? What will it be like if stays the same?" These questions can help you understand what lies underneath your urge to change, but they can also help you to identify a new meaning of yourself and the things you're uncomfortable with. 

4) Practice Self Care

Acceptance is hard. Getting caught up in a cycle of self abuse because we're not doing enough, changing fast enough or achieving goals successfully enough is far too easy. Be gentle on yourself when starting this practice and you may find that acceptance may even be easier than change! 

Want to feel better? Practice gratitude.

This is easier said than done, I know. It's hard to imagine feeling at your absolute worst and also finding someway to be grateful...but, trust me, it works and there is plenty of research to prove it! Among one of the best known researchers on the effects of gratitude is Dr. Martin Seligman, Director of the University of Pennsylvania Positive Psychology Center and Zellerbach Family Professor in the Penn Department of Psychology. Dr. Seligman is the founder of positive psychology which, unlike traditional psychology's goal of relieving human suffering, aims to actually improve the human condition. So what about gratitude? Well, as it turns out, practicing gratitude on a regular basis is one such way to improve the human condition. In his book, Flourish: A Visionary New Understanding of Happiness and Well-being, Seligman offers a simple practice called the "Gratitude Visit" that promises to enhance your well-being and lower your depression (to see the exercise click here). Another exercise from Dr. Seligman, and one that I often encourage my clients to try to implement in their lives on a regular basis, is the "What-Went-Well-Exercise." The first part of the exercise involves identifying what went well that day, a practice Dr. Seligman says most of us have difficulty doing:

"We think too much about what goes wrong and not enough about what goes right in our lives. Of course, sometimes it makes sense to analyze bad events so that we can learn from them and avoid them in the future. However, people tend to spend more time thinking about what is bad in life than is helpful. Worse, this focus on negative events sets us up for anxiety and depression. One way to keep this from happening is to get better at thinking about and savoring what went well."

Once you've identified something that's gone well (and even the tiniest of things counts!) the second part of the practice is, in my opinion, the most powerful. In the second part of the practice, you answer why that thing went well, which helps you see that you do, indeed, have agency in what happens to you and that you can make good things happen! This alone is a powerful antidote to depression. 

These exercises seem simple, but they are rooted in decades of rigorous research and highlight some of modern psychology's most important findings. So, if you have 5 minutes to spare at the end of the night (and we ALL can find 5 minutes) try incorporating a gratitude practice into your routine and increase your well being! 

Anxiety: Therapy Works

It is widely accepted that many of humanity's best and brightest minds also suffered with debilitating mental struggles from bipolar disorder to anxiety...Vincent Van Gogh, Abraham Lincoln,  Franklin D. Roosevelt, Virginia Woolf, Buzz Aldrin, Ludwig Von Beethoven...the list goes on. In this article, Charles Darwin's struggle with anxiety and the many failed attempts at treatment are discussed...including an attempt in 1865 by a certain Dr. John Chapman that involved having Darwin spend several hours each day encased in ice. Not surprisingly this treatment, and all of the other treatments he received, failed.  The one and only thing reported to have helped, was when Darwin stopped working and walked or rode in the Scottish Highlands or North Wales he found his health would be "restored." Unfortunately for Darwin, mental health treatment and the connection between physical and emotional health was little understood and rarely addressed. Had Darwin been alive today, he undoubtedly would have received a very different kind of treatment (therapy!) and very likely would have found some relief. There is plenty of rigorous research that demonstrates that therapy, particularly a form of psychotherapy known as "cognitive-behavioral therapy" (CBT) can be highly effective in treating anxiety disorders. It's clear that many people suffer from anxiety, including some of the most famous and influential people in history. If you suffer from anxiety, you may want to bypass packing your spine with ice for several hours a day and go for a walk or, better yet...find a therapist! 

Chronic Stress: It's the small stuff that gets you!

When talking about stress with patients, I often use an image a supervisor of mine taught me when I was in training. My supervisor described us all as rocks and described the daily, small-but-stressful events we all experience as tiny drops of acid on the rock. One drop of acid will do nothing to the rock but, over time, the persistent drops on the same place on that rock with eventually cause it to crack. So what can you? Stress is unavoidable, right? Right. Which is why stress and, according to this article from NPR, SMALL stressors in particular need to be dealt with before they literally kill you. In keeping with the rock and acid metaphor this means, if we can't avoid the acid,  then we need to move our rock around so it doesn't hit in precisely the same spot each time. I find that many people often don't know how to talk about stress and do not have any understanding of the best ways to deal with it. Obviously, therapy is a great way to get a deeper understanding of your own personal stress and coping mechanisms, but the article offers some very simple and effective solutions as well such as exercise, breathing, meditation and laying off the alcohol! 

Fixed vs. Growth: How to fine-tune the internal monologue that scores every aspect of our lives.

You are what you eat, right? Wrong. You are what you THINK! “If you imagine less, less will be what you undoubtedly deserve,” Debbie Millman counseled in one of the best commencement speeches ever given, urging: “Do what you love, and don’t stop until you get what you love. Work as hard as you can, imagine immensities…”

This might seem a little too simple and straightforward to be meaningful, however, in her new work Stanford Psychologist Carol Dweck proves otherwise. Dr. Dweck has looked at the power of our beliefs, both conscious and unconscious, and how changing even the simplest of them can have profound impact on nearly every aspect of our lives. One of the most basic beliefs we carry about ourselves, Dweck found in her research, has to do with how we view and inhabit what we consider to be our personality, which can be a mindset either "fixed" or "growth" oriented. A “fixed mindset” assumes that our character, intelligence, and creative ability are static givens which we can’t change in any meaningful way. A “growth mindset,” on the other hand, thrives on challenge and sees failure not as evidence of unintelligence but as a heartening springboard for growth and for stretching our existing abilities. From these two mindsets, which form very early on, comes much of who we are. Read this excellent article at brainpickings.org to learn more about why having a "growth mindset" is more beneficial and can help you become the person you want to be, and accomplish the things you value. 

Considering Your Future Self

For many of us, there is constant conflict between past, present and future. We are told at every turn to "be present" and to "live in the moment." But what about our future goals? How do we reconcile who we are now with who we want to become? I really enjoyed this article which addresses many of the challenges we face in constructing the life we want, and also offers helpful solutions to realistic goal setting. Reinvent yourself! 

http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/201404/reinvent-yourself