“I feel like…”

It is everywhere. It’s used in casual conversation as well as in newspaper columns, by my fellow therapists, celebrity interviews, novels and, sometimes, can be found in more academic writing. I’m talking about people saying, “I feel like…”:

“I feel like Bernie Sanders would be a good president.”

“I feel like she would look better with short hair.”

“I feel like you should major in psychology rather than engineering.”

In each of these examples, the speaker introduces their thought disguised as a feeling. “Bernie Sanders would be a good president” is a thought as is, “She would look better with short hair” and ” You should major in psychology rather than engineering.” The speakers may have some emotion or feeling that is generated as a result of their thoughts, but it is important to our management of emotion to be able to distinguish between a thought and a feeling.

Consider this statement that will be much more emotionally loaded: “I feel like women who have abortions should be punished.” If challenged by someone who has a different opinion about women who have abortions, the speaker could shut down the conversation by saying, “That’s just how I feel.” We’ve been taught that people are entitled to their feelings and that we have no right to discount someone’s feelings. The problem is, “women who have abortions should be punished” is a thought or, if held long enough and nurtured, can become a belief. While we may hold that people’s feelings cannot be challenged, when we identify a thought or belief in ourselves or someone else, we can stop to consider whether or not there is evidence to support such a thought.

It doesn’t matter the age (although Millennials seem to use it more) or the level of education (I just busted a PhD who has written three books),  I often hear my patients begin with, ” I feel like..” and then complete the sentence with a thought. This practice has become so ingrained, when I point this out, I am often met with a quizzical look.

Think about how the level of discourse could be elevated if people recognized their opinions as, mere, thoughts rather than thinking that their opinions have more validity because they elevate them, erroneously, to the level of feeling.

Person A: ” I feel like women who have abortions should be punished.”

Peron B: “Really, why do you think that?”

Person A: “That’s just how I feel.”

or

Person A: “I am deeply opposed to abortion and believe that women who have them should be punished.”

Peron B: “Tell me more about how you came to believe that.”

Helping my patients to identify feelings is central to my work as a psychotherapist. If I buy into convention and allow patients to continue with their thought as if it were a feeling, they will be impeded in their processes of identifying actual feelings that they may be having. I prefer not to be complicit in our culture becoming even more dissociated from feelings by allowing people to believe they are engaging their feelings with, “I feel like…” when they are, actually, entertaining a thought. I feel like, rather, I believe it will help us, as a culture, to become more emotionally competent when we are better able to distinguish what we think from what we feel.

Read more on this thought in this New York Times column by op-ed writer, Molly Worthen.

John Gottman, PhD is recognized by many as the guru of couples counseling. He and his staff conduct much of their research by holding couples captive (voluntarily, of course) in a Big Brother-style house. For days at a time, each and every movement and interaction between the couple is recorded and observed. Gottman gets to see how the interactions of “successful” couples differ from those who ended up getting divorced. After years of research, he claims to be able to predict, by observing a couple’s interaction for a very short amount of time, whether the couple is likely to be successful or not.

Gottman is a prolific author of advice to couples. This short article highlights several of Gottman’s key points building a successful relationship.

The vagus nerve is the longest nerve in the body. It starts in the brain and runs down the neck and connects to various parts of the gut and other viscera. Stimulation of this nerve produces a relaxation effect throughout the body/mind system. The simplest way to stimulate the vagus nerve is by taking long, slow deep breaths. I like to visualize the expansion of the lungs as they massage the heart. The heart, being a muscle, surely enjoys being rubbed. As the lungs expand and contract, they also stimulate the vagus nerve, activating the parasympathetic nervous system, the “rest and digest” (as opposed to “fight or flight”) part of the nervous system.

Here’s a easy to digest article about the vagus nerve with some simple to apply exercises for increasing vagal tone. You’re probably already doing some of them.

“If you suffer from an inflammatory condition, digestive upset, high blood pressure or depression [among many other conditions], a closer look at vagal tone is highly recommended.”

Read: 6 Ways to Instantly Stimulate Your Vagus Nerve to Relieve Inflammation, Depression, Migraines and More by Darou Wellness

 

Depression Sucks

Being around someone with depression can be very difficult. When someone that we care about is suffering, our natural inclination is to try to help. Operating around depression is the cultural myth that the person with depression just needs to try harder or snap out of it. There is nothing that a person with depression wants more than to be able to “snap out of it,” to be able to wake up one morning and not to be wrapped up in the heavy shroud that is depression.

Depression is like a well engineered virus. It undermines our efforts to do the things that will help to weaken it. It convinces us that we are too tired to exercise. It tells us, over and over, that seeking help is futile as no one could possibly understand. It destroys hope.

This article has some good suggestions about what not to say and how to help someone with depression. I would add that it is imperative that the person offering help not take it personally when the person with depression balks at the suggestions you make. If you offer, for example, to go for a walk with a depressed person and they decline, wait a while and ask again. Remember that there is nothing you can do to take the depression away from someone else. Be present with them, listen to them and be lovingly persistent until they find their way out.

“A lot of so-called ‘positive psychology’ can seem a bit flaky, especially if you’re the sort of person disinclined to respond well to an admonition to “look on the bright side.” But positive psychologists have published some interesting findings, and one of the more robust ones is that feeling grateful is very good for you.”

The concept of “gratitude” keeps popping up in many, various media forms. Now, with the advancement of technology, we can see what is happening in the brain when we engage in the practice of expressing gratitude and it’s good news.

Check out How Expressing Gratitude Might Change Your Brain from Science of Us.

Suffering is the result of trying to hold on to the amazing, resisting the awful and believing that we’re doing something wrong when life is, merely, ordinary. Breathe into all of it. Happy 2016!!

If you struggle with mood disregualtion, it is important to know that you don’t have to  just sit around and take it or hope that the bad feelings will go away. The mind is something that can and must be managed in order to live peaceful, productive lives.

Here are some easy suggestions for helping to manage the mind. It would be nice if all we had to do was read the post and all would be well. But, optimizing our moods will take a bit more effort than that. This post offers 4 easy to implement strategies for improving mood.

There is no author to credit so thank you to Alex Korb  for the insights and to whomever put this information together so concisely.

 

 

 

I’m not sure why this post singles out women. These suggestions are appropriate for anyone who feels tightly wound. The tools suggested in this post are presented in a light-hearted manner but the author makes a really good point when she suggests not, merely, reading and viewing the tools as “objects[s] of contemplation” but to look at each one and begin to bring into practice those that resonate for you. Here’s the post “5 Things That Will Help Even The Most Tightly Wound Woman Relax.” Here’s to relaxing into life.

If you haven’t yet, please “Like” my professional Facebook page.

“Coming Out” as an EFT practitioner

I have to admit, in spite of the benefits that I have observed in myself and my patients (see previous post) as a result of using EFT, I still, sometimes, feel a bit sheepish “coming out” to others as an EFT practitioner. Emotional Freedom Techniques is considered a CAM, Complementary and Alternative Modality. Although many strides have been made over the past few years in demonstrating the effectiveness of EFT in helping people deal  with many different psychological/emotional issues, there are still many who view the strange-looking tapping techniques with skepticism. It is difficult for many to believe, even when they witness or experience it, that long-held psychological/emotional issues can be rapidly vanquished where other, more conventional, approaches have failed. When I added “Mindfulness-based” as descriptor of my professional orientation to my web site a few years ago, I thought that was moving a bit out on the limb of credibility. At the time, little did I know that I would be exploring a modality that is, sometimes affectionately and other times derisively, referred to as “Wo0-W00.”

Research Supports EFT Efficacy

The support for the efficacy of EFT has been steadily increasing over the past few years. Many professional organizations of the therapy community, including the National Board of Certified Counselors, Association of Social Work Boards, National Association of Alcohol and Drug Abuse Counselors and, most recently,  the American Psychological Association have all approved the study of energy psychology techniques, including EFT, for continuing education credits. These organizations that work to maintain the integrity of the mental health professions have deemed energy psychology to be worthy of consideration and further study.

The psychological community is slow to embrace new methodologies. Thankfully, before a modality is accepted, it must undergo stringent studies. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, a very widely used modality, was not fully accepted until after about 20 years of scrutiny. EFT was introduced in 1995 with many years passing before anyone considered researching it. Here is an article that discusses a new study that validates EFT’s effectiveness stating, “EFT has actually met the criteria for evidence-based treatments set by the American Psychological Association for a number of conditions, including post-traumatic distress syndrome (PTSD).”

More and more I am receiving calls from prospective patients who have found my profile among those of other energy psychology practitioners on the Gold Standard EFT and Association For Energy Psychology web sites. It is exciting to me when someone calls and, specifically, asks about EFT.

I’ll continue to be a pioneer in the area of energy psychology, after all, pioneering is in my blood. Several years after moving to Utah from the east, I learned that my maternal grandfather had spent time working on the railroads in the west. As a young man, he had left Greece on a steamer ship, crossed the Atlantic and, then, traveled across the continent, looking for a place to land, a true pioneer.

If you’d like to know more about EFT, visit my tapping web site or contact me . I’ll be happy to talk about it.

Working way too hard

There’s a story that I first read in one of Steven Covey’s books about a lumberjack.  It goes something like this:

An old lumberjack labored at the side of the road. He had a huge stack of large logs that needed to be cut into more manageable pieces. He had been at it for a while, his dull saw getting bound up in the logs as he struggled to cut. The old lumberjack was cursing and sweating when a young man came walking down the road.

“It looks like you’ve been working hard.” the young man said. “Why don’t you take a break in the shade, drink some water and sharpen your saw?”

“Can’t you see how much work I have before me? If I take time to sharpen my saw, I’ll have to stop working.” replied the lumberjack.

“But you could work so much more efficiently if your saw were sharp,” advised the young man.

“I’m much too busy to stop working. Now, please leave me to my work.”

Sharpen the saw for a smoother cut

Of course, stopping to sharpen the saw in this story represents being present enough in our lives to be able to recognize and respond to the need to take care of ourselves. I

often wonder what the world would be like if we were all more skilled at recognizing our inherent value to the point that we would acknowledge when our saws were dull and to tend to them. We wouldn’t be “too busy” to exercise or “not have the time” to meditate.

Hidden Energy Killers

Steven Covey says, “Sharpen the Saw means preserving and enhancing the greatest asset you have–you.”  Here’s a good article, Do You Know the Hidden Energy Killers in Your Life?  It offers some sound suggestions for managing our energy through engaging in self-enhancing behaviors and avoiding the behaviors that deplete us of our life force. Here’s to moving along the path of valuing ourselves enough to stop and sharpen our saws.