Monica Berg's Blog, page 37

Are You Ready to Meet Sam Likely?

You need a Valentine’s Day plan. Hear me out.

While February 14 can evoke a wide array of emotions, one thing is for certain: we could all use more love in our lives. Some of us welcome celebrating a day devoted to love in the middle of winter. Some of us resent the pressure to buy chocolate/roses/cards for our partners to prove our affection (but do it anyway). And some fervently wish the day didn’t even exist. Whatever your feelings and past experiences, reframe Valentine’s Day as what it should be every day: a day of love, of deepening love, expressing love, and even finding new love.

Seeking: New Love

Even this year, in the midst of a pandemic with social distancing rules still in place, we can be connected and even make new connections. If you were single at the beginning of the pandemic, you don’t have to remain single. Many people I know seem to have taken 2020 off from the dating world entirely, treating it like a bye-year. 

One woman visibly cringed when I asked her why she hadn’t been using dating sites. Her shoulders crept up to her ears, she averted her gaze and muttered that it just feels so desperate. What? Why?! I don’t espouse to be an expert at online dating, as I’ve never done it. As someone who met their husband the old fashioned way, through happenstance, chance encounters, I don’t understand why this is seen as the gold standard for ‘how to meet your partner.’ Some couples have even confessed that their ‘how we met’ story was a complete fabrication because they were too embarrassed to tell people they met online. Even people who met their future spouse online seem to have bought into the utter falsehood that only the unlucky, the desperate, or the losers use dating sites.

I love you, single people. I love love. For goodness sake, get over it, get online, and find someone to love! 

You are in good company, too! After a few years of declining popularity, the number of people joining dating sites skyrocketed last year. According to data company Apptopia, the top twenty dating apps gained 1.5 million daily users in 2020. There have never been so many options! And more niche dating sites popped up, too. I love the specificity of niche sites for people who have honed in on precisely what they’re looking for in a partner. 

FarmersOnly.com “because city folks just don’t get it” Ourtime.com caters to the 50 and over crowd VeggieDate.com matches vegetariansTheAtlasphere.com is for Ayn Rand fansAlikewise.com makes love matches based on the books you like Geek2geek.com is for, well, geeks, I suppose Christianmingle.com matches Christians Jdate.com match-makes Jewish singles   Democraticpeoplemeet.com targets matches by political leaningsDatingink.com brings fans of tattoos together

FarmersOnly attracted 27-year-old Silicon Valley resident Alana. She loved nature, but the tech guys she was dating considered themselves outdoorsy when they drank cocktails on a patio. She created an account on FarmersOnly, and now she is married, resides on a mountain, loves her garden, and lives in a house made of straw bales. True story.

Nick Crawford met his match on the Hinge.co app, and they had their first date on March 7, 2020. They met up in a bar where they both contracted coronavirus (mild cases). They’ve been socially distancing together ever since.

Pandemic or not, there are a lot of people out there looking for a special someone. You never know what might happen if you aren’t open to at least trying.

My daughter, Abigail, reminded me of this not long ago (not about dating, she’s eight).

Abigail has a smartwatch in case she ever needs to reach my husband or me. One day after school, Abigail excitedly told me, “Sam Likely called me at school!” I was as confused as she was excited. Who was Sam? Was Sam a boy or a girl? Was it a wrong number? Do we know a family with the last name of Likely? 

It was then I realized the caller was not someone named Sam. The caller ID read, “Scam Likely.” I explained what that meant and that he calls her Dad and me all the time. 

Abigail, being Abigail, still wondered who was on the other end of the call and what they may have wanted to discuss. Her openness and innocent curiosity make me wish we could all be a little more like her; she has the wide-eyed expectation that everyone who comes into her life will be a fun and pleasant new adventure. 

Why not sign up for some new adventures and see what happens? 

Seeking: Deeper Love

That openness can be applied to all of our lives, even if we’re in a long-term relationship. 

You may have been married 10, 15, or 20 years. You may have raised children, purchased home(s) and cars, traveled together, and know each other’s daily routine. And although you have a relationship that might convince you you know everything about your partner, you don’t. We make a lot of assumptions about the people in our lives, and sometimes the longer we’re together, the more thoroughly we presume we know them. 

But, what we think may not be true.

Even if you think you know everything about your long-time partner, keep Abigail’s innocent curiosity in your heart. Take a step back and ask questions. Confirm what you “think” you know. Maybe your partner has new items on his or her bucket list. Perhaps they’re yearning for a trip to Thailand after a friend spoke so eloquently about the country (although Asia was never somewhere either of you had a strong desire to visit). Maybe they want to start playing the piano again (after 20 years of ignoring the baby grand in the living room). 

This Valentine’s Day, we can celebrate the people in our lives and actively support them with unconditional love, accepting them for who they are, where they’ve been, and who they’ll become. This is the kind of love we all truly want. It makes us feel supported, safe and gives us the freedom to become our best selves. 

Now, isn’t that better than chocolate/roses/cards?

Rethink Moment: If you’re unattached, commit to a way to meet someone new. You have choices! And if you’re in a relationship, put together three questions that you think you know the answer to, and ask your partner. What do you think you’ll learn?

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A Messy Life

Let’s talk about the word “perfect.” 

If we’re honest with ourselves, we aspire to perfection. We want the perfect relationship, children, test scores, grades, and successful careers. We strive to be the best mother, daughter, husband, and son. We want it all (whatever that means) and even feel a little cheated by life if we don’t get it. Media messages reinforce this pursuit of perfection. We see airbrushed photographs on magazine covers, all filled with product advertisements assuring us of the whitest smile, most flattering jeans, and the fail-proof diet that will make us beach-body ready. 

Whew. 

Perfection is exhausting. I know: It’s a word that has been at the center of my life for as long as I can remember. In fact, I spent the first half of my life trying to be perfect. Since then, I’ve worked just as hard not to be perfect. 

But what does the word actually mean?

In Latin, the word for perfect is perfectus and means “to finish.”

In Greek, the word is teleos, meaning “completeness.”

The word perfect means… we’re done. We don’t need to strive to be better, do better, create more, or, in fact, do anything. We couldn’t BE any more than we are because we are complete. We have arrived.

Not a very exciting existence, when you think about it.

We all know as long as we’re breathing, we are not done. We are here to learn and grow and become our best selves. We won’t do that by hiding behind an illusion of perfection and fearing we’ll be exposed if we’re somehow less than perfect. We do that by embracing something else: an artfully messy life which includes another dreaded word: mistakes.

So how do we rethink mistakes?

Not-So-Great Expectations

We can start first by looking at our expectations in life.

A while back, I was counseling a couple, and the wife kept saying she was unhappy in her marriage. She actually wanted to leave her husband. We talked at length, and I was puzzled because when she talked about her marriage, she wasn’t really unhappy. We went back and forth, and I finally realized she had an idea of what the “perfect” marriage should be—and her reality didn’t reflect that expectation. When she let go of that elusive expectation, she became more aware of how much she really had. It was a rich life that might not be the standard “Ozzie and Harriet” existence, but it was, in fact, more rewarding and full of love. 

The Good Mistake

I suggest we should abandon our expectations of perfection and, instead, expect a messy life filled with mistakes. We can even welcome those missteps. We should expect failure as we try new hobbies, professions, sports, or even recipes. We can even celebrate them! If we want to achieve anything new or different, we will err as we hone our craft. Even those people with an immense amount of innate talent —say, someone like musician Elton John, who from an early age could play the piano by ear without a single lesson—still need to practice, hit a wrong note, mix up the verse and bridge, in order to become an even better musician. 

I’m not saying it’s easy. It can be difficult to welcome errors with open arms and not take them personally. In fact, we can mistakenly regard mistakes as permanent failures. They feel irreversible. They cause shame or regret. That gives mistakes a lot of power to make us miserable! I suggest we look at our errors and, instead of shaming ourselves, accept where we are and recognize they’re a necessary part of a life of exploration and growth. 

Then we can ask, “What have I learned from this?”

Whatever is worth doing at all is worth doing well. – Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield 

Stanhope’s quote is often repeated, but I prefer a small tweak: “Whatever is worth doing at all is worth doing poorly, badly, inexpertly.” After all, it’s the trying and failing that leads to success.

Kabbalists say energy is never wasted and never dissipates. My mother-in-law, Karen Berg, once wrote: “The only thing in this universe that does not diminish is energy. In its raw form, energy can neither be created nor destroyed. Whatever we put out in terms of energy is what we can receive back.” We need to put our energy into becoming our best selves, free of fear of making mistakes. This may result in what might look like a “messy” life, and that’s not just okay, that’s preferable.

Ego No More

The mistake is, ironically, in how we view mistakes. We can let our ego overrule the lesson and berate ourselves, saying, essentially, “What an idiot I am.” That thought only serves to shame you (maybe over and over) and does nothing to help you to grow. Kabbalists believe none of us experience something that we didn’t need to experience. Our mistakes exist to guide us so that we act and do something different in the future. We grow nearer to our best selves.

For someone who purports to like order, this is admittedly a push-pull struggle for me. Over the holidays, my husband, Michael, and I went on a date night on a freezing evening in New York City. We talked about the idea of what a messy life looks like. It’s interesting for me to think about this subject because, as a Virgo, I love my lists, plans, and order. I like getting from A-Z in my day; it gives me a sense of accomplishment. At least, that’s what I think I like. But, as I told him that night, I’ve learned that when I approach my life that way, when I am planful and methodical, I tend to be less happy. There’s no room for mistakes or learning when I grow rigid in my plans. I think I want my lists and order, but the truth is, when I have my hands in too many things, when life gets messy, when I’m a bit all over the place, I actually feel the most free, liberated and creative.

I recently read Beth Berry’s blog, “Life Is Meant to Be Messy (You’re Not Doing It Wrong),” and felt an immediate connection when she wrote about her difficult year. Her family recently moved back to the United States, where she and her husband started new and separate businesses (at the same time). They’re adjusting to life in their new town and working on their marriage. Life felt unbearably difficult and not the way it should be lived. Certainly not perfect. Then she realized that although it was truly messy, “our growth was off the charts.” I experienced the same when we moved our family of six from Los Angeles to New York more than seven years ago.

She concluded that the mess she disdained was just life in action.  The pervasive myth that we’ll finally be happy after we get our lives in order is “simply another disempowering cultural story. A story that has an entire generation of humans (and particularly mothers) feeling bad about ourselves, scrambling to ‘keep up,’ and futilely spending billions in attempts to find solace.”

So I suggest we relegate the idea of perfection to some dustbin of archaic goals. Instead, let’s elevate and cheer for the noble mistake, the error that resets our lives, helps us grow and learn, that brings us closer to the people we are meant to be. And closer to the Creator.

Rethink Moment: What mistake in your life are you grateful for? What mistake, in hindsight, was actually a blessing?

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Real Simple Online

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Self-Care on Your Spiritual Journey

Self-Care on Your Spiritual Journey

Welcome to the final blog in the self-care series! We’ve talked body and mind, so let’s wrap up with spiritual self-care—all the things you can do to support your spiritual journey.

Let’s start with a question. Are you on a spiritual journey? Are you crystal clear on what that even means? 

There is no wrong answer because there are as many spiritual journeys as there are people on them. At its core, it is an intimate quest for enlightenment, for insight, answers, and understanding about the world, yourself, your friends, your purpose, and the very nature of life itself. While understanding is the ultimate outcome, notice it isn’t called a spiritual destination. This implies that the process is the purpose. It’s the seeking and evolution that enrich your experience of life. And when you’ve arrived at one understanding, that inevitably leads to more questions. And off you go on a new path of discovery.

Humanity has hungered for thousands of years for enlightenment, which is defined as the “full comprehension of a situation.” It would be a mistake to see complete understanding as the point of a spiritual journey, though. Imagine a murder mystery that told you on page 1 who did it. Would you even bother to read the book? Unlikely, because the enjoyment comes from the discovery, not the answer. Just so for a spiritual journey, daily discovery feeds our souls, brings us joy, and motivates us to seek further, grow more, and change ourselves even more dramatically. 

Interestingly, enlightenment is the English translation for the Buddhist term bodhi. Bodhi comes from the root, budh. Stay with me! Budh means awakening. This is another inherent element of a spiritual journey, to be awakened.

Just as every journey is different, everyone has their own sense of being awakened. In my estimation, at its core, to be awakened is to be in a state of seeking, growing, changing, and forging a deeper connection to the Creator. Imagine a life lived while completely awake, it would be exhilarating, you would see beauty everywhere you looked, you would be in awe of the divine spark that resides in every person you see; in short, it would be an awareness and gratitude for living in a world where the miraculous abounds.

Who wouldn’t want to be awakened?

Obviously, we would all love that, every second of every day, but it can even be elusive when we’re actively looking for it. And while it doesn’t necessarily happen when we expect it, here are a few tips and tools that I hope will work for you to have more wakefulness in your journey.

Gratitude

I can almost hear the eye-rolling from some of you! I know, I know, gratitude practices, gratitude retreats, gratitude journals, but it’s only ubiquitous because it actually works! In our day to day lives, we feel grateful, yes, but we are not awakened, not awed by seeing your child’s face, or filled with joy just because you opened your eyes and were alive one more day. This is completely normal. Humans just aren’t built to sustain constant enlightenment, fully awakened, total consciousness. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t strive for it as often as we can.

Think of a time in the past when you felt awakened. Try to recall a time when you were so overwhelmed that you almost couldn’t process what you were seeing. Perhaps you were in the presence of great art at the Uffizi, stepped through the doors of a mighty, soaring cathedral-like Notre Dame, peering down on the whole of Manhattan from the top of the Empire State Building or standing in the shade of an immense sequoia tree. Recalling that memory can help you achieve that state. Recall how you felt, how things smelled, remember the textures and sounds that accompany that memory. 

I have memories from a very early age of having God over for my tea parties. I took my tea with milk and sugar, and God took His black with a slice of lemon. During my tea parties, I felt safe, loved unconditionally, free from worry and fear, completely certain, and overwhelmingly grateful. I love returning to that memory and state of consciousness.

What am I? 

My son, Josh, and I were talking about the new year. Josh always inspires me with the way he processes life: his thoughts are beautifully complex, yet he possesses a simplicity, a total lack of artifice or agenda, that escapes most of us. He told me, “When I grow up, I want to be part of a football team. Do you think I could do it?” 

If you read my blog or listen to my weekly podcast, you know Josh is a young adult, very athletic, with plans to become a personal trainer. He was also born with Down Syndrome. I responded by telling him, “I hope that all the things that you want for yourself will come to be. You should dream and go after them.” 

Then he asked me, “What are you going to be when you grow up?”

I responded by telling him I was already grown up.

He looked at me, quite matter-of-factly, and said, “So, what are you?”

That is a worthy question for anyone on a spiritual journey. While it’s important to know who we are and what we believe, a spiritual journey demands that we allow our identity to evolve as we gain more understanding. What are you now? What have you been? What do you want to be? 

Exercise in discovery

Let’s do an exercise. Start by putting on your investigator’s hat and do a self-inventory. Make a list with two columns. In the first column, write down all the qualities you’re proud of. 

Strength examples:

Good parent
Safe driver
Excellent baker
Generous
Creative
Thoughtful

In the second column, make a list of your traits and qualities that hinder you or create challenges. 

Weakness examples:

Occasionally short-tempered with your aging parents
Indecisive
Depressed
Poor listener
Undisciplined
Disorganized
Short-tempered

Got it? Now, switch your lists. Your strengths are actually your weaknesses, and your weaknesses are your strengths. 

How does that feel? Confusing? Frustrating? 

WRONG?

Let’s go through a few examples. There’s nothing wrong with taking pride in being a good parent, but does that prevent you from changing how you support or interact with your children? Are you perhaps a little too certain that you’re an excellent parent and thus not open to new ideas? Blind to some area of your child’s psychosocial needs?

And if you’re occasionally frustrated with your aging parents, perhaps that’s a sign that something is amiss. Your concern certainly means you’re invested in their health and happiness. Maybe that irritation is an indication they need support—support you can’t provide. Maybe it’s time for a change —a caregiver, a social worker, access to friends, or even a daily walk in the sunshine. You see they need some change in their lives because you love and care for them, but it’s manifesting as frustration and impatience. 

Perhaps indecisiveness was originally on the weakness list. Now that it’s a strength, perhaps you can reframe it to notice how you choose carefully, after spending time to research and evaluate your options. That makes you thoughtful and thorough, not dithering or tentative.

How could your strengths hold you back, and how can your weaknesses be powerful? It’s all in how you see yourself and what you have decided is and is not, part of your identity. When we look at our strengths and weaknesses, we think of them as black and white. Good and bad. But it’s not that simple. Kabbalists teach we live in an upside-down world. The parts we think are important often aren’t. And what we dismiss as unimportant often turns out to be quite the opposite. 

I Don’t Care, at All

A spiritual journey will demand that you let go of your need for the approval of others. It will require that any validation you seek come from inside you, not outside from other people, or to meet societal expectations. This exercise is a good place to start evaluating how many of your strengths may be influenced by the expectations of others and how many are core to your identity.

Go back to your list of strengths. My guess is that everything on it is socially acceptable or what society has deemed you are supposed to be. I’d like you to look at your list of strengths and identify which ones reflect your passion and talents, which ones you are expected to possess by other people, and which strengths get the bulk of your time and focus. For instance, if you have children, you are expected to be a good parent. I’m not saying you shouldn’t be, of course! I’d just like you to identify why you cultivated the strengths you have. 

To be clear, there is nothing wrong with any of your strengths! Nobody would dispute your excellent qualities. But if you look at them for what they are, you’ll see them as less good/bad and instead as opportunities for change and growth, and the further pursuit of what makes you, you. 

So, as we do our self-inventory, think about how we can flip the judgment of ourselves to understand where our lives might need extra work and where we’re on track. We can consider how we can let go of others’ opinions and lead an authentic life based on our authentic selves.

I believe 2021 is the year for great personal and collective change. Individually, we can all do our best to press the reset button and take care of our minds, bodies, and spirits. We’ve just been through a year that could be considered a “life quake.” My husband, Michael, believes it was a “world quake”—a wake-up call for all of us, everywhere, to either move forward or risk falling back. It’s time for us to move forward, together. 

 

Rethink Moment: Challenge your partner, best friend, or even your child to do the strengths and weaknesses exercise with you. I guarantee you’ll walk away with new discoveries, and you’ll both have a better idea of where you are on your spiritual journey. Don’t forget to cultivate more awakenings whenever you can.

 

 

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Your California Life

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Clear Your Mind and Put That Bucket to Use

What did Abraham Lincoln, Ferdinand Magellan, Galileo Galilei, Thomas Edison, Charles Darwin, Frederick Douglass, and Franklin D. Roosevelt have in common?

They were all leaders, visionaries, free-thinkers, idealists, and people who changed the world through their passion and vision of the future. 

And…they were all Aquarians.

Aquarians are the visionary rebels. But they don’t seek change for the sake of change (or to instill chaos). Rather, they want to change the world for the better through original thinking and by defying convention. They are known in the cosmic realm to be a channel for improving the world—the do-gooders of the cosmos—standing for justice, challenging power structures, and speaking for those who cannot.

Such is the power of the Light of the new moon of Aquarius. Each month has its own unique gifts, and Aquarians brings new energy and the possibility of reparation, of setting things right. It’s there for all of us, but we need to know how to not just access it, but how to use it.

Cool, clear, water

The image associated with this month is a bucket pouring an abundance of clear water. Both are gifts from the Creator, who created the vessel and its contents. 

The water symbolizes the ever-present abundance available to us all this month. We all know when we come into life, we’re given blessings of greatness, knowledge, awareness, and consciousness—the clear waters of our soul. We are constantly connected to the source of all these gifts, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

As we go through life, those waters don’t stay pristine. We muddy them through our desire to receive for the self alone. So every time we act in a way that’s unkind, selfish, hurt someone else, or with anger or jealousy, our waters grow murky. We lose our clarity, perspective, and struggle with doubt. We hesitate about making choices. We actually feel unclear. We’ve lost access to the precious gift.

That’s why this month is so powerful: we can clear away the muddy water. We can take back all those actions. We can learn, start anew, and feel refreshed. And, yes, this requires some work.

That’s why we all have a bucket. To go back to the well, so to speak. To get more “water”— knowledge, awareness, and desire.

When any of us start pursuing anything in life, even a spiritual path, we can easily get into a routine. And even a spiritual routine is still… a routine. So day in and day out, we do the same things, over and over. And sometimes, ironically, we lose sight of what we’re seeking. If that happens, maybe it’s time to rethink how you’re spending your time. Your choices. We aren’t meant to do things as we’ve always done them. 

Here’s an example from my life. Several years ago, I went through a period when I looked closely at every path I had chosen. Whether it was running marathons, practicing vegetarianism, studying homeopathy—even rethinking what I learned in my study of Kabbalah— I realized if I didn’t stop to question why I chose my path (and do this regularly), it would grow stale. I would lose enthusiasm and purpose. I wouldn’t grow. If you sleepwalk through your days, you won’t be open to blessings that come along with them. 

That was a powerful realization for me. You can only tap into blessings if you understand why you’re making the choices you are making. 

Boredom is a sign

So often I hear people say they’re stuck in their lives. They’re uninspired by their work. They’re going to school because it’s the “right thing to do.” They’re working at a job that may pay the bills, but every Sunday night, their hearts sink, dreading going into the office on Monday. They’re doing what they’ve always done but not reevaluating whether it’s the path they want to take or who they are now… or why. It’s just routine, and there’s a great danger in that. 

It’s our responsibility to dig deep. To go further, deeper, and question everything we think we understand. 

We need to use our bucket.

The Rav always said that is the number one message: consciousness is everything. What will keep us motivated and excited to do this necessary spiritual work? What will it take to constantly learn, relearn, expand our consciousness? If you want to receive all of the blessings that come through all of your actions, you must take a moment to rechoose your path. If you want to understand the world around you in a different way five or ten or twenty years down the line, you need to use your bucket to go back to the well to get more water.

If you think you have enough water to get you through the next month or year and it sustains you, you don’t need to go back to the well. But if you consciously think and know that water has served you well, but there is more consciousness, understanding, more water for you… then you need a bucket. 

Maybe a big bucket. 

And that’s how you’ll find the clear, cool water.

Rethink Moment: 

Every day this month, consider the following:

Remind yourself of your connection to the clear water.Employ your bucket to strengthen that connection.Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

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Sunday Edit

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Talking Back to White Bears: #2 Self-care for your Mind

Ready for more self-care? It’s a good topic for the beginning of a new year, and I think it’s such an important topic that I’m dedicating three articles on the subject. This week, we’ll discuss another equally important (and sometimes overlooked) area of self-care: your thoughts. Self-care begins internally. It’s  knowing who you are, having an awareness of your thoughts, and managing how you talk to and feel about yourself. Confidence and empowerment are just a couple of byproducts of proper self-care. 

One of the foundations of well-being is listening to and honoring your inner voice and being open to what you hear. You know that voice. Sometimes it is empowering and creative. Sometimes it is motivating. Other times it might be fearful, angry, frustrated, demotivating, or downright spiteful. Pay attention to what that voice is saying, especially when the message is negative. Become aware of what is going on in your inner life. 

Your mind is an obedient servant. That means what you think about yourself will likely come true. That is such powerful knowledge: you move in the direction of your thoughts. It is imperative to be aware of what you think and the way you talk to yourself. Your future exists first in your mind. And the more positive the thoughts, the more likely you’ll have happier, more productive days, weeks, and years ahead of you.

“The positive thinker sees the invisible, feels the intangible, and achieves the impossible.” –Winston Churchill

The Change Junkie in me loves this quote.  

Essentially: if you can dream of something that seems unreachable; if you can see a different world or a new goal; that’s the start toward achieving it. It all starts with a thought… a dream… a vision. Isn’t that the way with every invention or scientific discovery? It is all born from the seed of a thought. And Kabbalah teaches us this is the Creator, speaking directly to us. How powerful is that?

But the reverse is also true. Chronic negative thoughts, especially fears about an unknowable future, can inhibit our dreams and growth. Those self-defeating thoughts are sneaky. They exist to protect and keep us, namely our ego, safe. Of course, nobody wants to get hurt or be in danger. At their best, they keep us from making dangerous mistakes.

Negative thoughts can also just as easily instill fear of the future and the unknown—something we have no control over. We all know shutting down that voice is not that simple or easy. It’s hard to push those thoughts away. Next to impossible, actually.

I love the example of white bears. Right now, do not think about white bears. Don’t think about them at all.

I know what you are all thinking about: bears. White ones, to be precise. Thoughts are powerful, maybe even at their most powerful when you are trying to ignore them.  All of us have been in situations where we want to get something off our mind, and we keep ruminating about the same idea over and over again–especially when we wake up at 4:00 AM, and our mind is running the same thought over in a loop. 

The white bear meditation actually springs from a theory. Psychologists have identified something called the ironic process theory (also known as the white bear problem). It is a process where the mind attempts to avoid certain thoughts, and by avoiding makes that thought all the more intrusive. Telling yourself not to think about white bears will create the opposite: you’ll only think of white bears. And as the author, Eckhart Tolle said, “Whatever you fight, you strengthen, and whatever you resist persists.” 

So become aware of those thoughts that don’t serve you. Don’t run from them or try to ignore them, acknowledge them, and then reply to them with their opposite. Reply to the thought “Nothing ever works out for me.” with “I am lucky. Things happen easily for me.”

Let’s consider some hypothetical changes you may want to see in your life in this new year and how to practice mindful self-care.

Like so many, you may have made a new year’s resolution to get in better physical shape. You even signed up for remote yoga classes and nutritional counseling. You’re motivated at first (you paid for the support, after all), but after a few weeks, some doubts sneak in. You might be discouraged by the time it’s taking to reach your goal (and your sore muscles). That voice keeps whispering… it’s too hard… it’s taking forever… you won’t ever get fit. Instead, when you hear that voice, acknowledge it as your frustration. Then, envision what it will feel like when your muscles grow stronger, when you gain more energy, and fit into your clothes more easily. Replace the thought with “How I do anything is how I do this.” In the words of Glennon Doyle, Jennifer Nettles, and kindergarten teachers everywhere, “We can do hard things!” Keep going.

You may have set a goal for advancing your career in 2021 but are frustrated by your career trajectory.  In fact, your job may appear to have little growth potential. I say “appear” because we all know businesses grow and evolve, sometimes in ways we can’t foresee. If you lose hope and become discouraged, you might conclude you’ll never get promoted. Even though you’d like more responsibility at your job, you’ll just do the bare minimum every day. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Instead, take on more assignments, and set a goal, and when that voice inside protests that it’s thankless, or hopeless, or pointless, you reply back, “This is when change happens.” 

Rethink Moment: We all have changes we want to make in the new year. As the days go by, keep your eye on the goal and recognize those white bears that might derail your plans. Wave to them. Smile at them. Then tell them how it really is!

Next Week: Self-care for your spirit

 

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Sunday Edit

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Self-Care: Body Edition

The new year is nearly here, and for most, not a minute too soon. I think we’re all looking forward to it with renewed hope and energy. The end of December is traditionally a time when we reflect and consider how we want to step into the new year. Have you made any resolutions?

I have. This month, I’m thinking about self-care as a way for all of us to take our best selves forward.

Today marks the first in a series of three blogs on self-care—body, mind, and spirit—as we move into the new year.

Over the years, I’ve learned if I want to be the best partner, mother, and professional, I need to put myself first. I know it sounds counter-intuitive (self before others?), but it’s really not. Self-care is not inherently self-ish. It can make all the difference in living our own full, creative life and being present in our loved ones’ lives. When we’re at 100% in mind, body, and spirit, we can be our best selves. We owe it to ourselves and our families to protect and nurture our bodies.

“If we are creating ourselves all the time, then it is never too late to begin creating the bodies we want instead of the ones we mistakenly assume we are stuck with.” —Deepak Chopra

As we get ready to ring in the new year, let’s reconsider and prioritize the areas in our lives that are sometimes neglected. 

Sleep: Every living being comes with a system for restoration and repair, yet we can underestimate or ignore our need for a full eight hours of uninterrupted rest. Sometimes it’s unavoidable, such as when a newborn joins the family. Other times sleep gets pushed aside in favor of… what? College students often boast about pulling “all-nighters” in order to finish a term paper. Some of us binge-watch The Queen’s Gambit until the wee hours of the morning. And a good book can keep us turning pages as the clock ticks the night away. The ultimate result of all of this lost sleep isn’t  just the brain fog the next day—lack of sleep is credited with serious physical maladies—everything from obesity, heart disease, depression, and decreased life expectancy.

Sleep is deeply restorative; the corollary benefits are nearly endless. It boosts the immune system, helps maintain a healthy weight, strengthens the heart, improves your mood, increases productivity, and increases exercise performance. A good night of sleep almost ensures you’ll have a productive next day.

The irony of spending more time sleeping? During your waking hours, you’ll accomplish more and be present with the people you love.

Exercise: I work out six days a week. I started out as a long-distance runner (and even ran marathons in the past). At one point, I noticed that running wasn’t working for me the way it used to. I began shifting my routine based on the feedback I was getting from my body. Several years ago, a friend introduced me to the Tracy Anderson Method, and I found my groove. On top of the exercise, I’ve made friends, and the classes are so much fun. 

Like running, the TA Method provides a meditative experience. I can’t tell you how many times I finished a class and discovered that I had a solution to a problem or a new revelation and left feeling inspired and creative. I definitely consider this crucial ‘me’ time. 

Like getting enough sleep, I am simply not my best self without my exercise routine… and I am fiercely protective of that time in my day.

Gut balance:  

“The road to health is paved with good intestines.” Dr. Sherry A. Rogers

The gut is considered the mini-brain or the ENS (enteric nervous system), which, like your brain, uses neurons to send information to other cells in your body. It communicates back and forth with our brain—with profound results. Scientists are learning more and more about how our gut “talks” to our body.

Take a moment and think about that: your digestive system tells your brain how it is doing and can even dictate your emotional state. For instance, for years, scientists and physicians thought anxiety and depression contributed to functional bowel problems such as bloating, pain, and stomach upset. Today, researchers believe gastrointestinal irritation may actually send signals to the central nervous system that trigger mood changes. Jay Pasricha, M.D., director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Neurogastroenterology, writes in an online article, “These new findings may explain why a higher-than-normal percentage of people with IBS and functional bowel problems develop depression and anxiety. That’s important because up to 30 to 40 percent of the population has functional bowel problems at some point.” In other words: depression and anxiety may be triggered by our ENS (and not the other way around).

Since the ENS is utterly responsive to what you eat, I am mindful of what I ingest and take a daily probiotic. I watch my sugar intake and do my best to stay away from processed foods. If you feel a little “off” and can’t put your finger on what it might be, take a look at what you’ve been eating.

You are truly what you eat.

Rethink Moment: With the holidays in our rear-view mirror, let’s take the next week to prioritize our bodies. Go to bed thirty minutes earlier. Take a walk around the block rather than watching TV. Be mindful of what you put in your body. I promise: a week from now you’ll feel like a new person in the new year.

 

Next Week: Self-care for your mind

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