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becoming increasingly mindful of our triggers is crucial because it sometimes allows us to avoid flashback-inducing people, situations and behaviors.
will not let the bullies and critics of my early life win by joining and agreeing with them.
have legal authorities to aid in my protection if threatened by the few who aren’t. I invoke thoughts and images of my friends’ love and support.
Further encouragement and guidance for therapeutically angering at the critic can be found in Soul Without Shame, by Byron Brown, and Healing Your Emotional Self by Beverly Engel.
Then, and only then, are we able to reconnect with the helpful side of healthy self-criticism [see Stone and Stone’s book Embracing Your Inner Critic].
When I am temporarily stuck in a flashback feeling alienated from life, remembering what I am usually grateful for in life can sometimes pull me out of the polarized negative
They may be as simple as a catchy tune, an engaging color, a sweet scent, an enjoyable food serving of the day, a new flower in a local garden, a satisfying TV show, a neighbor’s hello, a feeling of fitness climbing the stairs, soothing words from a favorite author, or a pleasant encounter with a pet.
Old self-destructive neural pathways can be diminished and new healthier ones can replace them. A General Theory of Love by Thomas Lewis inspiringly explicates this
will perfectionistically micromanage you to prevent you from betraying or abandoning
Affection and protection. Healthy diet and sleep schedule. Teaching habits of grooming, discipline, and responsibility.
This is especially important during those “monster” flashbacks when the critic can bully you into wanting to give up. At such times, angering and crying at this terrible intrusion from your past can rescue you from forgetting how far you have come and how much safer you are now.
They become incensed about the ten thousand betrayals of never being helped in times of need. They feel rage that there was never anyone to go to for guidance or protection. They bellow that there was no one to appeal to for fairness or appreciative
If you are unable cry or feel angry, focusing on your breath may help you to emote. This is especially true if you attend to the sensations in your abdominal region as it expands and contracts during respiration. Deep, slow and rhythmic breathing stretches and expands various visceral muscles and internal organs in ways that sometimes bring feelings into awareness.
Early in my career, I worked briefly with a freeze-fight type client who was stuck in an avoidance process of endlessly monologing about her dreams. Dina recalled them in lifeless, excruciating detail. In fact, her deadened delivery was emblematic of the way she talked about almost everything.
This type of dissociation from internal pain strands the survivor in unhelpful ruminations about issues that are unrelated or minimally related to the true nature of her suffering.
When that occurs, you will know that your recovery work had reached a deep level.
Find a safe and comfortable place where you won’t be heard. Close your eyes and remember a time when you felt compassionate towards someone. This can be from real life, or from reading a book or a poem, or from watching a movie or moving news item.
Invoke self-compassion via the memory of someone who was kind to you, or imagine someone you think would be kind to you. I would be kind to you. Verbally ventilate about what is bothering you in a journal or aloud to a real or imagined friend or to me. Imagine yourself being comforted by a Higher Power. See yourself in the lap of a kind higher power or actual person who seems kind. [Santa Claus once worked well for one of my clients]. Remember a time when you felt better from crying or angering, or
seeing someone else cry in real life or in a movie. Remember a time when being angry, or when someone else being angry, saved you from harm. Imagine your anger forming a protective fiery shield around you. Imagine your tears or anger carrying any fear, shame or depression up and out of you. Imagine holding your inner child compassionately. Tell the child it’s normal and okay to feel sad or mad about feeling ...
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Put on some moving or evocative music. Watch a movie that is poignant. Watch a movie that...
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Moreover, depression is sometimes an invaluable herald of the need to slow down for rest and restoration.
trigger us into flashbacks, rather than incidents that repeat the gross insults and ordeals of our childhoods.
bring her whole developing self. No one is there for reflection, validation and guidance. No one is safe enough to go to for comfort or help in times of trouble.
“I feel really sad about what happened to you.” “I feel really angry that you got stuck with such a god-awful family.” “When I’m temporarily confused and don’t know what to say or do, I…” “When I’m having a shame attack, I…” “When something triggers me into fear, I…”
Third, I do not share vulnerabilities that are currently raw and unintegrated.
A codependent defense of being perpetually pleasant and agreeable had been deeply instilled in him.
As my client became more skilled at being vulnerable, he was rewarded with the irreplaceable intimacy that comes from mutual commiseration.
The word “rescuing” is often used in such an all-or-none way that any type of active helping is pathologized.
The link to this is www.creativegrowth.com
Should the therapist respond to you in an aloof, critical or shaming way, I would immediately cross them off your list and keep looking.
An important guideline for finding a safe enough online or in-person group: If you find that a leader or member is over-dominating a group through narcissistic behaviors such as monologing, monopolizing the time, pressuring anyone with unwanted advice or shaming anyone in anyway, please allow yourself to leave and try another group.
Active listening is based on an attitude of “unconditional positive regard”. It enhances the counselee’s process of full verbal ventilation, and it uses non-directive, non-intrusive verbal feedback
Do not give any feedback unless it is clearly asked for. The counselee often does well to be specific about the type of feedback desired, or the desire to not have any feedback; e.g.,
Practice therapeutic confidentiality. Let what is said in a session stay in the session.
This is especially true of those who further augment their reading with journaling about their cognitive and emotional responses to what they have read. I believe that journaling helps build the new physiological and neuronal brain circuitry that occurs as we
your life is your life don’t let it be clubbed into dank submission. be on the watch. there are ways out. there is light somewhere. it may not be much light but it beats the darkness. be on the watch. the gods will offer you chances.
know them, take them. you can’t beat death but you can beat death in life, sometimes. and the more often you learn to do it, the more light there will be. your life is your life. know it while you have it. you are marvelous the gods wait to delight in you.
Getting The Love You Want,
