Control and Shame

Control and Shame

by | Jun 26, 2023 | Blog | 0 comments

Control and Shame

 

Sometimes when we are so concerned with controlling every aspect of our lives, the people in it and how things go. We’re actually dealing with deep shame that lives at the center of that control. We may think it’s just the way we are, it’s just that we like things to be a certain way and we expect a higher standard from people. All the while we are actually ashamed of who and how we are, and we use control as the mechanism to bypass feeling how we truly feel. Let me illustrate this point.

I was thinking back to my childhood and how an incident with receiving a Barbie doll caused me deep shame and how later, this shame was actually managed through the mechanism of control. I remembered that I hadn’t received the doll because my caregivers got it out of their own free will, but I received it because I manipulated them into it.

I was 7 at the time. I remember going grocery shopping with my family and seeing a doll I really, really wanted. Of course, my family was not going to stop and get it so I did what a lot of 7-year-olds do sometimes –  I threw a tantrum on the floor of the grocery store. Arms wailing, voice screeching and tears rolling down my face, I completely embarrassed my family! Those of you with little children may identify with this scene. Those of you who ever witnessed someone else’s child do this, have felt the embarrassment of the mother/father and felt your own judgments come up about their parenting style. It’s an eyesore!

I remember the drive back home being quiet as I successfully manipulated, or embarrassed, my family into getting me the doll. However, I didn’t feel a sense of satisfaction. As a 7-year-old, I felt horrified and disgusted by my own behavior. I knew that it wasn’t the ‘right thing to do’ and very soon I started feeling awful about myself. So what did I do?

The next time we went grocery shopping I made sure I behaved like a ‘good girl’ and that I never threw a tantrum again. It didn’t stop there, it was a thought pattern, that was born in my 7-year-old self and maneuvered its way into adulthood, as I began controlling what I allowed myself in situations with people and things.  The shame of thinking I was a ‘bad girl’ was so overwhelming I would make sure that I behaved in a way that was more resonant of someone good. I kept myself in line. 

We do this when we feel deep shame. We make ourselves bad and wrong for being a certain way, based on what society says is valuable and acceptable, or not. We try to control the outcomes in our lives just so that we can avoid feeling that awful feeling of being ‘bad’ and ‘wrong’. Shame erodes our sense of self; it erodes our sense of being in the world. When we feel shame we cause a split within ourselves and what develops from there are all sorts of fanciful alterations to who we are, just to avoid being ‘wrong’. These can stay with us for a really long time. We may start people pleasing, just so that we can feel ‘good’ again, even when it is to our detriment. We may start suppressing our voice and our truth, just so that we can feel like we belong. This may start to feel painful. Essentially all the pain we feel is due to us separating from our sense of wholeness. 

So what can we do in order to move out of shame? 

  • We can get honest with ourselves about how we feel about the situation.
  • We can get honest about what we really feel beyond our need to control ourselves, our environment, and our loved ones. 
  • We can find people who are loving, kind, and supportive as we speak out on our shame. 
  • We can open to our wholeness and allow ourselves to receive good things from people in our lives and from life itself.
  • We can stop apologizing for taking up space and instead say thank you to the people who are willing to hold us in our pain.

 

In love and gratitude,

Need more guidance?

If you want to work with me 1:1 CLICK HERE to  enroll for my coaching program where I tailor a process specifically for YOUR transformation.

Settling the Nervous System and PTSD

Settling the Nervous System and PTSD

by | Mar 24, 2023 | Blog | 0 comments

Sometimes in life, there will be unforeseen incidents that may make our hearts pound and leave us shaking at the knees. One such incident happened to me over the weekend and re-ignited a long-forgotten PTSD response.

Myself and my little chihuahua had been bitten by a dog that escaped its yard in our apartment complex. We both got away relatively unscathed. After my heart rate returned to normal and I made sure that my Belle was alright I sat down and felt the most unnerving and terrible feeling in my body. It felt like I had sand in my veins – a most uncomfortable buzz that I had solved many years ago after having suffered through it for many years of my life. My body was experiencing PTSD. 

This time was different, I had support from friends and loved ones along with an arsenal of techniques to get me out of freeze mode. I got my yoga mat out and did some T.R.E. (trauma release exercise). It felt good to feel my body shake off the stress. I allowed myself to cry out all that fear that was stuck in my body. I started feeling angry at the owner, who was negligent enough to not secure his front gate that allowed the dog to escape, so I grabbed a couch cushion and screamed the anger into it until I felt I was completely done. I did a few side stretches, to help my nervous system to settle. I felt semi-decent again. I took a call from someone I love dearly, and we spoke through the event, and after all that, I felt like I had passed it. 

I tried to move through my day as usual but what I noticed was that my thoughts were all heavy and dark and there was a tightness in my body. Something was still gripping me tight and I realized I hadn’t fully let go of the incident from earlier that day. I focused very intently on gratitude and trying to notice the positive things about my day but it was almost as if I had no access to them. I was stuck in a loop with PTSD. 

The next day, I repeated the whole process of the day before all over again – and then the release came. I wept hysterically, and as I did something broke open. It was a feeling that came through very subtly and softly that gave me access to peace. It was my nervous system settling. I wanted to share this piece with you especially if you have been struggling with a dysregulated nervous system or if you have been stuck in a shock response for some time. You can familiarize yourself with some of the tools I mention. It may not help you instantly, but it does have an accumulative effect, I can assure you. 

Here is a summary of the tools and techniques I have used, along with some added practices: 

  • T.R.E. – great for shaking off stress.
  • Talking to someone you’re close to as a support.
  • Deep belly breathing or Holotropic Breathwork
  • Journalling
  • Expressing your emotion through crying or screaming 
  • Yoga or deep stretching
  • Gym workouts
  • Playing music that you feel is appropriate.

I hope this serves 

Need more guidance?

If you want to work with me 1:1 CLICK HERE to  enroll for my coaching program where I tailor a process specifically for YOUR transformation.

God Is in the Details

God Is in the Details

by | Mar 13, 2023 | Blog | 0 comments

5 years ago, if anyone would have asked me what I would be putting into my body in 2023 there was no way I would have answered ‘predominantly raw fruits and vegetables’. My answer would largely resemble something along the lines of ‘cakes and anything that tastes good’. In 5 years, a lot has changed but change hasn’t happened overnight. It’s been a slow and steady slink to a healthier lifestyle, and if I was still choosing incorrectly for my body, my body would make certain that was no longer the case!

The thing is that things change over time and it’s not the time that does the changing but it’s our conscious decision to change. A lot of us make very drastic resolutions when there’s a new year ahead of us but what often happens is that we cannot sustain the same gusto and momentum as we did when we made those resolutions and we give up – either because the task we set out for ourselves is too big and overwhelming to achieve or because that thing is still working for us in a way. In any event, when we fail to reach our goal we downward spiral into negative thinking patterns about ourselves that can devastate our self-image and any future attempts at success. 

So how can we get to where we want to go? Incremental changes! James Clear has an entire book dedicated to habit building. ‘Atomic Habits’, details exactly how to go about forming new habits (a worthwhile read)! What I found is that pretty simple, small incremental changes over time that are easy to achieve and enjoyable make for great success. We often don’t achieve what we want to because we make it really difficult for ourselves, we put pressure on ourselves to get it done but we forget to have fun with it, and we forget to make it play. 

Here are some tips for getting to your 2023 goals and resolutions:

  • Get into the mindset of seeing your goal as something to play with. Lighten up around it!
  • If it’s a big thing you’re wanting to achieve like cutting out sugar from your diet, try cutting it out incrementally over a period of time and not all at once!
  • Acknowledge your progress and find small ways to celebrate them.
  • Remember why you are doing what you are doing.
  • Smile! You’re handling a lot!

Need more guidance?

If you want to work with me 1:1 CLICK HERE to  enroll for my coaching program where I tailor a process specifically for YOUR transformation.

Change Through Kindness

Change Through Kindness

by | Mar 6, 2023 | Blog | 0 comments

Have you ever tried to change an unhealthy behavior or a limiting belief by beating yourself with a stick?

You know what I’m talking about – when we treat ourselves like a bad child, we reprimand ourselves and berate ourselves for how badly we’ve done. Raking ourselves over the coals with our own harsh judgments. If you’ve ever tried to quit smoking or lose weight, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about. 

What happens when we do this is we create a negative child-parent relationship within ourselves. We become the harsh authority figure we need to rebel against. Any progress we do make from this judgemental space within us is short-lived and unsustainable. We may successfully diet and exercise for a week, but we can’t sustain it because the ‘’child’’ wants to rebel against that authority figure we’ve created. We go back to our unhealthy eating habits and give up on exercise altogether. 

This happens because we’ve denied the part of ourselves that seeks comfort in unhealthy food. We’ve denied the part of ourselves that is looking for love and kindness. The part that is asking for ease and comfort. 

Now notice what happens when you reflect on the habit or belief you want to change from a place of understanding. More like the loving, supportive parent. Suddenly change becomes a bit easier to implement, once you understand why you were doing what you were doing in the first place. Once we approach ourselves in a kind way, change becomes a lot more possible. If you are kind to yourself and have a fallback, you don’t give up on your process or yourself, you understand that falling is part of the process and you make adjustments that you need to make, cheer yourself on, and get back up.

This was my experience with smoking. I had been a smoker for years and always wanted to quit. I would only get so far until another stressful sh*tuation would happen and I was back to it, pulling on a nicotine stick for my fix, to ease the tension and worry. Until I realized why I was smoking in the first place. I was getting a payoff from smoking, or that was the belief. Every time I would experience stress or worry, my cigarette would make me feel like I was experiencing relief (later I realized it was just the act of sitting outside and allowing myself to breathe deeply, that really brought that ease to me).

I lost count of how many times I heard myself say ‘’It’s my last one, I’m trying to quit”. I got tired of the cycle and thought I’d approach it from a different perspective. I got more curious about how my smoking habit was helping me survive, or what I believed my cigarette was doing for me. When I realized my smoking helped me get through so many stressful situations and really was a bit of a companion during those times, I started looking at myself and my habit with a kinder lens. 

I started smoking intentionally. I would roll my cigarette (yeah, I smoked rolling tobacco) and decide why I was smoking it before I would light up. I would also thank my freshly rolled smoke for having been a companion during tough times for so long. I would then light up with a commitment to my intention in mind. For the entire duration of my smoke break, I would keep my intention in my mind until I was done. That process lasted a few months and I found I smoked a lot less and eventually I didn’t need to smoke anymore. I never went back! 

What you can’t achieve with harshness, can be achieved with kindness!

Need more guidance?

If you want to work with me 1:1 CLICK HERE to  enroll for my coaching program where I tailor a process specifically for YOUR transformation.

Have you identified your values?

Have you identified your values?

by | Feb 27, 2023 | Blog | 0 comments

I have been finding that we create from our values. What we prioritize in our day or in our lives will usually give us an indication of how much value we place on that behavior or thing. For example, you are not going to place a high value on eating brussels sprouts if the chocolate bar gives you more pleasure. Essentially you’re valuing sensory pleasure more than you are nutrition. 

The entire process happens within a nanosecond, and we usually aren’t aware of the fact that we are making a choice in the first place. It happens at warp speed. It’s all been automated for you by your sensory experience and/or the values we adopted from our parents/caregivers. Sometimes we wonder why, when we have a clear intention, we still aren’t achieving what we set out to achieve. 

What I have found is that a lot of the time, there is an internal conflict between our intentions and our values about that particular thing/person/behavior.  We may have a strong and clear intention to save our money but we ‘just can’t help ourselves’ at eating out a few times per month because we really like the social element of eating out. In this situation, we’re placing a higher value on socializing than we are on saving money. There is a value misalignment between what we find valuable and our intention.

How can we streamline this process?

  • We have to check our values and make sure that all of our parts are on board with our intention.
  • We need to look at how receiving that thing or achieving that outcome is going to be valuable to us, how is it going to serve our lives. How is going to add to our lives?
  • Define your values for yourself – what motivates you to do the things you do? Don’t bullsh*t yourself or tell yourself lies. Be honest about what motivates you.
  • Pinpoint how exactly your intention fits in with your values. For example, I would like to lose 5kg because I want to look and feel healthier. (intention) I would have to then prioritize health and value my evening walks instead of the high value I put on relaxing in front of the television.

Getting our values and intentions aligned may require us to make behavior the necessary behavior changes and if your intention is clear, you will have all the willpower to exercise over this process.

Incremental changes are how we improve and transform any aspect of our lives.

Need more guidance?

If you want to work with me 1:1 CLICK HERE to  enroll for my coaching program where I tailor a process specifically for YOUR transformation.

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