Seriouslyourself

How can you let go of a feeling you've never really held? Have you ever thought to yourself, "I've heard so many people say this but I don't know how to do it"? In this week's podcast we go over how to do just that.




Hi there, come on in. This is Seriously Yourself, the podcast and I'm Ingrid Helander. 

Hey, welcome, welcome, come on in. How you doing? Oh, I hope you're well. Today, we're revisiting something that came up I think was an episode 37. And in it I was talking about sort of subverting, is that the right word? Subverting, getting you know, going around circumventing? I think that's what I mean, feelings that I don't really like by thinking about them so much. So I would, you know, put them up for judgment and you can hear that if you go back to episode 37, it's called "motion, not negotiation" or something like "emotion without negotiation". 
But today I really wanted to talk a little more about a comment that I made in there that has gotten some attention and that I think is really important, and that is the comment that you cannot let go of something that you haven't already held right? You can't let go of something if you don't hold it, have you tried? It just doesn't work right. You know, if I catch a ball that someone threw to me and I've got a hold of that thing, I can let it go, but if I go to catch a ball and it glances off my shoulder, leaving a bruise that I ignore and I don't hold on to that ball and someone says, well let it go, I don't know what they're talking about because there's nothing to let go. And we do this often, I would say, oh just let it go. How many times do people say just let it go would you just let it go. And of course letting something go make sense, especially for driving the other person crazy ruminating about what is upsetting or hard for us, right? Just let it go. Yeah. Well the problem is you can't let it go because you haven't held it in the first place right? You haven't embraced it. You haven't given it enough actual sensate right to hold. You could hold something in mind right? You could just hold it in your mind and what are you gonna do? You're gonna say it over and over and over. You're going to repeat it. It's gonna come back to haunt you because it's held in the mind, right?

So I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about actually taking the time to notice the fullness of what you feel. To notice what comes up in you around a feeling and to get real about it like oh hi hello who's that? What's making that feeling inside me? And usually again why would I was gonna say usually we tend to avoid holding bad feelings but I think as many of us also tend to avoid holding good things, right, compliments or gratitude right or happiness or joy. It's hard to hold both right? The one feels a little dangerous to hold, you might get too cocky or too insular to secure and make a huge mistake and oh no, right and the other just hurts just painful. So we don't want to hold that one either. But I would say if we don't hold them, we can't let them go, we can't release, we can't let them be where they properly need to be. Right. And so the statement of just let it go cannot happen until we know what it is we're letting go of, right?
 So how can you do that? That's not an easy practice in the seriously yourself community. I think it was last February we were working on the concept of joy and lament in the same month, right? It was like this oxymoron, this juxtaposition of these two very different things, joy and lament, but what joy and lament or joy and greeting, joy and sorrow, however you want to put it have to do with one another is that they are both full. They both hold a lot of deep feeling and meaning, right, and to witness them together is to find a way to hold that depth. That sensation, love charisma delight, deep grief, loss, all of it to hold it to feel it. And then, you know what honestly, you don't even need to let it go because what we discovered is that when you do that, it sort of lifts it sort of elevates it sort of rises in a way and you're not even casting it off, letting it go, it just moves and it tends to move up and out and leave you with the most wonderful sensation of hope, of clarity, of well being, of connection. 

So what do you feel? You've been trying to let go of and let go of and let go of? And people have told you maybe just let it go or you tell yourself or you even, you know, you just hope you can let it go or you pray to let it go or you think you would let it go and then just get smacked with it again the next day, or the next time someone says something to you that gives you that feeling, Oh, it's right back to snap, right? There was no letting go. It was like lying dormant. Yeah, because you didn't hold it, he didn't hold it. And I'll think about holding something, okay, I wanted to make it really clear holding or embracing is not like being it right? I can be a baby. Well, I can't be a baby, but I was but I can't, if I'm all baby, I couldn't hold myself right? That's just silly. Maybe it's a silly example. But in order to hold something, you don't just run it through your mind and hold judgment. That's episode 37 decide if it's valuable or has a right to be there now, it's there. Guess what? You sort of lift it up and if you imagine holding anything, it's in front of you, right? Our hands are such that when we live something, it's usually in front of us. If it's not switch it around and look at it in front of you and notice in the body, what am I carrying? What is this? What is this twinge or pain or heaviness? Fear? What is this that I would just as soon let go of? What am I letting go of? What parts of me are connected to? It. Does it remind me, does it bring me back to an earlier time in my life? Right? Is it to worry about the future? Is it just this sensation of? Well yeah, that person said this and it hurt but it shouldn't have. No, no, no, that's the mind thing. It did. So what part of me took the pain? Right? A part of me took the pain and then hold that part so that you can be with it. Let it tell you, let it show you, right, take a breath into it. This is what we did in our group with sorrow and joy with sorrow and delight, lament and joy. We really held them both out front and allowed ourselves to be with them. 

Yeah, there are things you may need to actually let go of release. I would say, you know in your mind's eye, don't just drop it or push it or backing away if you really intend to release something, take a breath and you can release it. You know the IFS, the internal family Systems model way, is releasing it to any of the elements right to the earth, to water, to fire, to air and sky, to the sun, to light, right? Or to anything right? You can imagine now I am so done with this pain that, you know, never belonged to me. It was, you know, my grandfather suffering that my mother decided was mine. I don't know, I'm making this up now. Well, not exactly and you can put it in the garbage can, but you can't put it there until you really know what it is and that you really know you have permission inside you to release it. I think that's another thing that comes up with the concept of just let it go, our brains and a lot of us, you know, really says, oh yeah, of course, I don't want to feel this pain, sorrow, bitterness, resentment, anger, frustration, annoyance, I don't want to feel that grief, heartache, I don't want to feel that anymore. And so, yep, let it go. But you gotta make sure inside that there's no sense of like, I'm not ready. You know, there could be a part of you that has no idea that you're even there and you're off letting this go and letting that go and inside they're like, yeah, well, good for you, but I'm still hanging on to this pain. Yeah, so if it doesn't work for you. I just want you to understand, you're not weird or broken. There's a reason it doesn't work. There's reasons it doesn't work okay. It's not all on you. 

So imagine something small to start. Imagine something small a feeling you know that maybe is a little uncomfortable, just a bit, maybe someone said something the other day or you're just kinda languishing on an email you had gotten that didn't sit well maybe you saw something a movie that bugged you right? And instead of just committing it to be let go, take some time with it, hold it in your hands, put it in front of you. You know, take a real good look at it, breathe, see what comes up in your body, see what words you hear in your mind, notice what parts of you are interested in what you're holding in your hand and that will help you find that. 
It's really so special. So sweet to get to know all of these nuances within us. It's such an honor. You know, it's like our gift as human beings to be able to spend time any time at all with these impressions sensations, feelings, you know, even if they hurt a bit to place them in front of you and be with the pain instead of absorbing or being in the pain, be with it, hold it, embrace it. Take good care of you this week. And hopefully this is something you can remember as you go through your week. Just taking that moment two to hold on, just a little longer before you let it go. Maybe you'll find you don't need to let it go at all. So good to be with you this week and hope you get great joy and delight just being more and more of who you are every day. See you next time. Bye. 

Thank you for joining me for this episode of Seriouslyourself. To help treat yourself well each week, go ahead and subscribe to Seriouslyourself wherever you listen to podcasts, and please share this link with anyone you love who might be seeking a little more truth and delight in their lives. If you just can't get enough and you'd like even more goodness, you can become a part of Seriouslyourself, The Membership Community. You'll receive a monthly magazine, personal gatherings and cool little treats delivered right to your mailbox. Find out more about that on my website: https://ingridyhelanderlmft.com/seriouslyourself-the-membership/. And thanks to those who make Seriouslyourself special: our wonderful music is Midsummer from the album Flood by the fabulous Joel Helander. Seriouslyourself is produced by Particulate Media, K.O. Myers, Executive Producer. The ideas and inspirations come from beautiful humans like you, that I feel lucky to know. And I'm Ingrid Helander. Take good care of yourself. See you next time. 


 

Hi there, come on in. This is Seriously Yourself, the podcast and I'm Ingrid Helander. 

Hey, hi there, come on in, how are you? Good to have you with me today, I feel like we have kind of a little bit of a relationship going, what do you say? That's what we're talking about today, relationships. You know, one of the best parts of being a family therapist, marriage and family therapist is that I've gotten to work with so many people, around so many different kinds of relationships, it's been delightful and I still really, really enjoy that aspect of my work, just helping people to restore relationship, understand relationship and most specifically to really grow in relationship to themselves and to others, and that's a lot of what this podcast is about, right?
 
How do we grow in relationship to ourself and also to the world around us and to everything that we love those we love. So, this month in the seriously yourself community, we've been talking about relationships and the interesting things within talking about relationship is we often think, oh, you know, well I'm not really in a relationship, if I'm not partnered up or married, but of course you are in many relationships. And if you're in, say a married relationship or a partnered relationship, you might feel like, well that's my relationship and it is and it's a big one, but hey, you have many, many kinds of relationships. And I have a notion that often what we bring to our relationships with other parts of our lives, we bring to our primary emotional relationships as well. So it's worth looking at and playing with a little bit and that's what we're gonna do today. So I hope you'll stick around. Let's keep going here. Let's unravel that thread of relationship. Yeah. 

So take a breath right now. And I'm gonna mention some things that I think you probably may have a relationship with. And as you hear them, your job, if you so choose, it is just to notice how do these concepts make you feel when you think about yourself, your relationship to this topic, right? That I'm gonna mention and notice your mind, notice what you hear yourself say and notice the feelings in your body. Okay, let's give it a go. It's kind of fun. So number one, your relationship to your family of origin, your relationship to your romantic partners, your relationship to your children. If you have them or to Children. If they're not yours, your relationship to your home, your body, pets or animals in your life, your community, your town, city, county, state, country, Anyone you consider to be "other" in quotes other your possessions, special things you have, you can hold you own, your car, maybe your relationship to money, your own creativity, your spiritual life or spirituality, the earth and the natural world. So what happened? What happened inside you as you were listening and you thought about what's my relationship to this, right? And you can add any relationships that I haven't thought of, right? Maybe fitness or food or a substance, right? You can add anything. And it's quite interesting to notice rather than these parts of our lives just being, there are just being things. But to notice a relationship right? The give and take between us and this part of our lives, right? And really noticing how much we care about it, What difficult feelings come up, you know, constraints in the body that indicate, oh, there's something going on here that probably I should pay attention to. Yeah, all really valid. Worthwhile moments to have as you consider being seriously yourself.

 Now, one of the things that I think is important is whenever you're in a relationship right, you really should notice what you bring to it. What preconceived notions, what kinds of energy, what attitudes, right? And opinions you bring to it. So you might be thinking about say your spouse and you would notice, okay, what energy do I bring when I'm with my spouse, thinking about my spouse imagining having a conversation with my spouse. Do I feel safe inside? Do I feel aggressive? Do I feel calm? Do I feel loving? Is my heart open? All those things really matter? The thing to remember in any relationship? And this is like if I had every couple just write this on their foreheads backwards so that when they look in the mirror every morning they would see it. And I mean me too, because this is the hardest one to remember. In all relationships, the only thing you have direct control over is, yep, you got it yourself, right yourself. So we want to change everything about the other person, right? And I I say this as a family therapist who's had, you know, over two decades of experience, no one ever comes in. Well that's not true. Sometimes people come in and they say, you know, I really want to relate better, but then they want to tell you everything that the other person needs to change so that they can relate better to them. And honestly, the change starts inside, right? It starts with you and that is regarding any of these relationships that we mentioned. 

I was in a workshop, oh gosh, long time ago. Now, I really don't even know, maybe 2014 2012 could have been 10 years ago and the woman was leading it on the topic of money and her first question was something like, what is your relationship like with your money? And you know, honestly, I had never other than thinking, I hate thinking about money, I hate working with money. You know, don't like the whole thing about it. I had never really thought about that as being a relationship, but it is, it is a relationship, it's how you relate to, right? It's how you get along with, its how you pay attention to. So as you're thinking about this then, remember you have to notice what you bring. You have to notice that you're the one you have control over. That's another point here, I'd like you to notice that if you have a really strong negative agenda which would sound like this has to happen or this has to change or I'm feeling you know what that would feel like, right? Like don't do that if you were talking to someone else or I don't like this about you, right? So this could be your home. I don't like this about you, my home. I don't like this about you, my finances. I don't like this about you, my family of origin. I don't like this about you, my physical surroundings, I don't like this about you, my body. You see how it kind of can apply. So if you have that really strong point opinion perspective, you can have that and it might very well be true, but you have to get some space from it before you bring it to the other because you are not fully yourself when you have a strong, strong agenda that is a part of you that you are feeling sort of dominated by, that is sort of driving the bus. And as I will mention over and over again, when you have a part of you that sort of taken over that part will seek to protect you. But nine times out of 10, it will get you the opposite of what it desires and it will get you what it's trying to save me from. 
So say for example, you're feeling like your dad is greedy with you. Like he hasn't been generous with you and you have an agenda, you're gonna set him straight, you're gonna go and you're going to relate to him and you're going to communicate, you know what dad, it's just been wrong. It's not fair and you are selfish and greedy and I don't like it. If you come from that energy, you are probably going to create all kinds of defensiveness in the other person. They're gonna lock up, right? And when someone locks up, do they seem more generous and more greedy? Right? Yeah. You know now you can get that message across but you really have to spend some time with yourself. You have to come down to what what do I really need? What are the feelings under this? So what if he stays greedy with me? Does it really matter? How is it hurting me? What do I need him to understand now? I'm not saying that the person will always understand if you come to them with those deeper feelings. But I know if you come to them with a strong agenda, a negative agenda, they won't, they just can't and I think again you can imply this to other relationships that you have in your life. 
The other thing that I think can be really tremendously helpful is the ability for us as people to really observe what's going on. Have you ever watched children learn something? It's so fun to watch them because they just, they'll watch now some will watch actively, right? Like they're gonna use those hands and fingers and try to get in there. But mostly they're observing what is happening around them and they're gonna learn and they're going to get to know everything they're going to get to know well everything that you know now you came to know right? And the best way to do that is by feeling safe and calm and curious enough to just observe without agenda or maybe with a desire, right? Maybe with a hope, a love to get closer to make relationship right with whatever it is. But by observing. 

So if say your connection or your relationship to your natural world feels a little wonky, like I really like outside, I'm kind of uncomfortable or you know, I feel like I don't get out there enough and then when I do, I don't know what to do with myself, if I'm walking in the woods, I don't know. If you just find a place to just calmly observe. It comes to you, doesn't it? It comes to you and then you get to witness things that you didn't know or understand before. And it's true of all relationships if you ignore your money, right? If you cast the concept of money and finances aside because it makes you uncomfortable if you can get calm enough to look at your accounts or look at your earnings, look at you know, whatever money symbolizes you, even money in the hand and get curious about it, right? You're gonna change your relationship to that and it'll feel better. Yeah. 

So take some time this week and just go over your list. What are you in relationship with and how's it feeling for you? And then you could apply those little notes? You know, am I noticing what I'm bringing? Am I taking direct control moreover myself or wanting to take control over the outside? Do I have a strong negative agenda or opinion that I need to enforce? And can I calmly observe with curiosity. Hope that helps. Hey sending you lots of love, lots of calm, lots of curiosity and really an openness in all relationships. I hope that they feel wonderful for you. Look forward to talking to you again soon. Thanks for stopping by, bye now. 

Thank you for joining me for this episode of Seriouslyourself. To help treat yourself well each week, go ahead and subscribe to Seriouslyourself wherever you listen to podcasts, and please share this link with anyone you love who might be seeking a little more truth and delight in their lives. If you just can't get enough and you'd like even more goodness, you can become a part of Seriouslyourself, The Membership Community. You'll receive a monthly magazine, personal gatherings and cool little treats delivered right to your mailbox. Find out more about that on my website: https://ingridyhelanderlmft.com/seriouslyourself-the-membership/. And thanks to those who make Seriouslyourself special: our wonderful music is Midsummer from the album Flood by the fabulous Joel Helander. Seriouslyourself is produced by Particulate Media, K.O. Myers, Executive Producer. The ideas and inspirations come from beautiful humans like you, that I feel lucky to know. And I'm Ingrid Helander. Take good care of yourself. See you next time. 

Hi there, come on in. This is Seriously Yourself, the podcast and I'm Ingrid Helander. 

Hello, come on in. Welcome, how are you today today? We have a topic that honestly, I just don't really like, but I think that's important to talk about. So what I don't like at all very often is disappointment. You know, I can handle being sad, I can handle you know grief, I can handle loss, but there's something about being disappointed or disappointing that kind of drives me nuts. I don't know do you have that? And I've been thinking about it and working on it and I'm curious about it, you know, disappointment often can kind of run my show. It's almost like something that I feel like, is to be avoided at many costs, almost all costs and that's big, right? I mean we shouldn't have to avoid any emotion I think at all costs that kind of feels just innately like a problem. So being that there are parts of me that really feel like let's get rid of all sources of any possible disappointment. Yeah, that can't be good. I don't think that can be good. How about you? 
You know, I was looking up the word disappointment and it comes from the french word, which is to disappoint, right? So you would actually be removed from an appointment to an office, you had been stationed in, right? Like say you were elected to mayor and then you were removed that would be a disappointment or if someone canceled an appointment that would be a disappointment and it's interesting how disappointment works that way. You know, we use it now to be something that makes you feel like you've lost and you've lost hope and you've kind of failed, right? And that would make sense if it came from a word that meant you've been removed from office, right? You've failed and I really think that's so tangled up in it. You know, words that are passed down generation after generation, they hold meaning in our bodies and I don't even think we often think about it or or know it until we start feeling our bodies and then we go, oh yeah makes sense. This disappointed thing. I feel like I have been let down on something. I was looking forward to say an appointment. I feel like I have been removed from an office, maybe even an honor. I have disappointed, right? 
So when you think about disappointment and maybe it's not a thing for you, you know, I don't know but what comes up in your own body, your mind? You know, one of the things that has happened lately and is the reason I'm talking about it honestly is that I think the sort of rise and surge and you know diminishing of the impact of covid and global pandemic and quarantining was that there was not as much need for protection of disappointment personally, does this make sense? So yes, there was colossal disappointment about everything. We had to go through all this stuff we had to undo. It wasn't a lot of doing as much except for maybe I was making crazy T shirt masks and wiping off my groceries and collecting, you know, toilet paper I guess that you would need. But you know, there wasn't a lot of outside activity to do. You know, most people couldn't even go to work. Your kids couldn't go to school for a while. You know, you couldn't go visit your grandma, you couldn't have Christmas all together. You couldn't, right, couldn't, couldn't couldn't, but you knew you couldn't, so the pressure to create moments of doing things sort of ceased very quickly very, very quickly. And there was that I'm so sick of having to sit in the house and oh, I miss going out so bad. I miss having a beautiful dinner in a candlelit restaurant and I miss going to this concert or sitting in a crowded movie theater. Yeah, yeah, we missed that. 
But because those things were not my fault if you will, that not being able to do those things was not under my control. I found it much easier to resist any feelings of disappointment. So I didn't have to worry that if I planned a birthday dinner and nobody could come or people got sick right or they were otherwise occupied. I didn't have to worry about any disappointment because it couldn't happen anyway. Or perhaps, you know, I wanted to have a vacation right. It had to be so boiled down right. Less people protected areas. You know a lot of work to make any travel or anything happen and so often I just didn't, it was just easier not to but I didn't feel bad or disappointed about that because I really couldn't do it anyway. 

And now many people well prior to now I realize but you know, I think as a whole the country is sort of saying well you know you can go about your life, you can move about the cabin now. Yeah and that feels great and for me this little tiny internal sensation of the possibility of disappointment is sort of peeking up its little head. It's sort of looking around like oh, oh I could make a mistake. I could want something a lot, like a beautiful vacation and maybe get sick or have the flight canceled or have a hurricane happen or nobody wants to go or or or right? Lots of catastrophizing gets associated around this sense of disappointment and it's all protective. It's all in the interest of not feeling like I've done something badly or that I am disappointed. I am either disappointed or a disappointment. So for me the way that I help this is not to dwell on it though, I recognize might sound like I am but it is to take it seriously which is what we do here it seriously yourself and to give it some time, give it a little airplay so that the parts of me that worry about disappointing or being disappointed. Don't feel so alone.For one thing that they know they have adult guidance, which would be me and all of the resources that I have at my fingertips and that I will listen. I will listen to them. You know when I sense into parts that feel disappointed and I begin listening, I also can feel kind of a deep well of sadness. I'm not even sure what all of it is honestly. But if you come across that, just know, it's okay. You don't have to feel like you're not all right. It's all right to take a breath. Ask for a little space inside from your parts that want your attention. Yeah. And just you know, notice them as if they were children or they were someone you care about. 

They don't have to take over your mind, your heart. They don't have to tell you. Yes, in fact, I'm disappointed because you are a failure. You are a disappointment. No, no, you're not a disappointment. And if you heard that sometime or you picked up that energy so much better to take a moment and let that part know, that was not true. Right. That was not true. You were not supposed to be perfect when you were five, You did not ruin everyone's vacation when you were four. You could not have known that everyone would get the stomach flu. That Christmas, that was not on you. I don't know if that helps or not, but whatever it is for you, right? 
The easiest way to do this is to get it on paper and I say that having done this for a long time that when you're really listening to your inner voice is your inner parts, your psyche. If you will, it's so helpful to be writing or drawing because you can see then and you can literally get a little space from what you're putting down, right? You don't want so much space that you have to push it away and ignore it and not listen but you want just enough space so that you can stay curious and calm and from there you have a million possibilities.

 If I don't get space, what happens is I hunker down around this disappointed fear of disappointing or being disappointed and I create all kinds of systems to manage that pain and then I don't go on vacation or I don't even try, I don't make plans, I don't make any effort toward anything that might be risky and that's not okay, right? That is in a way that I want to live. It's a way that that part thinks will be successfully safe. But it really only gets it more disappointment. Yeah. Yeah. That's a really key thing to remember that when you have these strong sensations inside or ones that have been there a long time and they want something for you. You know, like to never be disappointed again. The sad truth is if they feel like they are doing that by themselves and you operate around everything that protects them, manages them, keeps your life rolling away from them. You're gonna get exactly what you don't want. And that's the worst, right? But when we listen, we offer compassion. We help bring that part into today's world, right out of the past and into the present. And we notice that all that protection might better be used to well maybe to plan a trip or to invest in something or to do something that you might feel a little bit skittish about with the concept of you know it's okay. You know it's okay. No one's really watching, no one is going to blame you. And if they are you can talk to them about it. You are going to be all right. You're gonna be all right. So notice what parts of you worry about disappointing or being disappointed this week. Maybe let them know you're gonna be alright and spend a little time writing or drawing from them. It's a really amazing thing to do and it only takes a second and it doesn't have to be perfect. It's just starting. It's just a matter of starting right now. You can start by simply breathing and feeling your own feelings in a way that you can witness, let me know what goes for you. It can really be actually kind of fun and I'll keep you posted on how my disappointed part is doing as I'm up and around and doing more and I don't have that giant pandemic permission slip, be well, come join me and seriously yourself the community and I'll see you soon. Take care. Bye. 


Thank you for joining me for this episode of Seriouslyourself. To help treat yourself well each week, go ahead and subscribe to Seriouslyourself wherever you listen to podcasts, and please share this link with anyone you love who might be seeking a little more truth and delight in their lives. If you just can't get enough and you'd like even more goodness, you can become a part of Seriouslyourself, The Membership Community. You'll receive a monthly magazine, personal gatherings and cool little treats delivered right to your mailbox. Find out more about that on my website: https://ingridyhelanderlmft.com/seriouslyourself-the-membership/. And thanks to those who make Seriouslyourself special: our wonderful music is Midsummer from the album Flood by the fabulous Joel Helander. Seriouslyourself is produced by Particulate Media, K.O. Myers, Executive Producer. The ideas and inspirations come from beautiful humans like you, that I feel lucky to know. And I'm Ingrid Helander. Take good care of yourself. See you next time. 

Hi there, come on in. This is Seriously Yourself, the podcast and I'm Ingrid Helander.

Hello, hello, how are you? Come on in. It is really a gorgeous day here in New England and um I hope wherever you are listening from, it is also a good day where you are. Today, I'm talking about an interesting thing that happens inside of us and it's interesting, especially to me because with the help of my own therapist, I was able to discover something I was doing with the best of intentions that was making my life really way more difficult. And so I thought, hey, if I'm doing this, probably others are doing this too. And so I thought I would share it with you. So here's the question, do you have parts of you that are very concerned about being very fair, sort of maybe judicial, what's the word? You know, appropriate that are careful and considerate of others feelings and thoughts? Yeah, I bet you do. I bet you do. And I found this part of me that had gotten a little twisted up in that very state. That trying to be fair, which by the way, I do think is important, right? It's the responsible thing to do to take responsibility for our own actions, our feelings and our behaviors. But what was happening for me, which I was able to find thanks to a fabulous therapist that I work with and I'm gonna insert a little parenthetical here, (if you work with a therapist and they say they never work with a therapist, you totally have my permission to turn and walk out the door because you kind of have to do the work to do the work) that was in the side and parentheses? Right? 

So back to the topic here was this neat little way that I was sort of sabotaging my own parts and my own feelings with the very, very best of intention. I would say things like this. Well, a part of me feels this way And within about 20 seconds I would also say something like this. And that's not really fair though, because this person doesn't know they're doing that or it isn't their intention to hurt me. And so I should therefore feel differently. And the brilliant therapist that I see, was able to catch that and she went, whoa, your therapist ever make you slow down and stop and wait, wait, wait, take a look. 

So we started taking a look and it was something like this, I would have a feeling. Maybe it would connect to a thought. For example, something like my husband said this and when he said this, it kind of hurt my feelings and made me feel unseen. And then within seconds, but that's not really fair because I know that wasn't his intention and in fairness, he couldn't have known my feelings. And in fairness, you know, this is something maybe I need to deal with and on and on. So I would take every bit of responsibility for the feeling and put it up into my brain and set it up to be evaluated. Do you hear that? So rather than it just be a feeling or a passing thought attached to a feeling, we would be more like here is an article for your consideration, judge and take a minute and really notice. Is that fair and accurate and complete or is it not? And then another feeling would have to come in pretty quickly to balance that like, well, okay, that makes perfect sense and therefore I should really attend to myself so that I don't keep doing this unfair thing to someone else and the feeling would come up and it would end up in my system like I can't trust, right? I can't trust myself or anyone else to care about what I feel at that time, Right? Because there was no validation for even a moment about what I felt. It was a naming of it, which is a great first step and then I would jump right to well what's the judgment about it? Right. Do I have a right to be angry? Do I have a right to be hurt? Do I have a right to feel untrusting? Do have a right to feel portrayed? Do I have a right to feel invalidated? Do have a right to feel frustrated? Do I have a right to feel annoyed all day long? Do you see how that could happen? 

And as a therapist, you know very often? Well always I would say it's really important to be able to rest back and receive everything that your client is expressing in a way that is open and nonjudgmental and just allowing and clear. And I think that is always true, but it didn't really apply internally. In other words. I don't have to be so quick. Well, I guess it does apply internally. Like I wasn't doing it for myself right? Like I was so quick to go, yeah, let's let's just consider the other person, but not me. Let's consider the other person in a personal example, but not myself really, right. I could consider it by naming what I'm feeling. I'm naming that I'm annoyed, but that's not really right or fair because the person, you know didn't mean to annoy me, didn't know. 

So after realizing this, I'm recognizing, wow, I do this quite often. And what I believe it causes inside us when we do this is sort of this constant polarization, right? I feel this way, but I shouldn't feel this way right? Or I feel this way, but my thoughts say that's just wrong. Therefore do not. If you have this experience, I want you to listen in really tightly because this could definitely contribute to rumination that feeling of like I can't turn my brain off at night, right? Or in the morning or whenever it happens to you. That running mind because you're always sort of placing your feelings into the vat of judgment and evaluation and determination whether you should have that feeling and I'm here to tell you you already have the feeling. You already have the feeling so you don't have to stop and go. Should I have this feeling? That's a done deal. That's a done deal. You don't need to evaluate whether it deserves to be. It is, it just was already, are you getting it? It's subtle. It's weird. It's a little head trick. 

So what can you do instead? Well, the first thing is when you do name a sensation a feeling you have it is fine to not activate any parts in your mind that wish to decide whether you should or shouldn't have that feeling. It's a feeling, feelings happen they're happenings. Okay, take a moment and this is what I'm actually retraining myself to do and notice some part of me feels let's say frustrated and maybe this part has a story right, about what it's frustrated about. So maybe the story is my husband used my special facial soap in the shower as you can tell. This probably actually happened because who would come up with that? Right? So he actually used my special, more expensive facial soap as a body soap in the shower, though I had it separated from the body soap. So what I might feel is annoyed or irritated. Right, Okay, so my habit would be to name it, oh man, that's annoying and irritating and then instantly go into, but it's not really fair because I don't really remember if I mentioned to him what that was and I really can't expect that he would just know not to use it even though there is a bar of body soap in the usual place etcetera. Okay, lots of explanation, lots of justification for his feelings. And he, we haven't even talked yet, right? We haven't even talked about it. So now rather than doing that, what I'm discovering again is that it's important to name, whoa, I see my husband's in using my face soap and that feels annoying to me and then rather than jumping to the brain and pushing it away or reasoning it out of being. Acknowledging this feeling exists, currently I'm annoyed. 

Okay, so let's take a breath, taking notice. What's that feel like in my body. What does annoyance feel like? Well, feels kind of tight in my jaw. Maybe my teeth clench a little bit. Maybe my heart sinks and I hear myself say, yeah, "he doesn't care about my stuff or I don't feel like respected". Now this no longer is likely about my husband, but that doesn't mean it's not important for me to attend to and I want you to hear that. This is probably no longer entirely about the other person, but it is a feeling that you need to attend too with compassion. So maybe I hear that part say, you know, I'm not feeling cared for or seen or validated and then maybe I have a sense in my body of roots, right? Little parts from history that say, oh yeah, I was the youngest child, so maybe I didn't always feel respected. Frankly at that age, I probably, you know, didn't command a whole lot of it, that's okay, but I still felt it right. Or maybe I do find a current day something like it is important for me to verbalize, to speak to my husband about things that feel owie when they get run over a little bit without blaming or shaming or ignoring. 
You see, when we send those feelings directly to thought and try to balance them out, It amounts to sort of ignoring the issue on the outside because at least in my case I always lose, right, I always am the one that after I've negotiated with my own brain about this feels like I don't have the right to speak up about it. And so, you know, that definitely contributes to poor communication in my home, right? Because I'm always having the conversations with myself in my head and then sort of stuffing down the feelings. This is sounds like something you might do too? I'm gonna guess it might be. 

So maybe this week you just notice how often do you name what you're feeling, which is a really good thing to do, do it, but then move on as if, yeah, but I feel different ways and maybe it's not fair, or maybe I should just let it go. Maybe you should, but we can't let something go that we didn't hold to begin with. You felt it, you can feel it and it's important to feel it and to spend a little time with it, without explaining it away. So that's my little little word of this week. I hope it's helpful for you to if it is, please drop me a message and let me know, let me know what you like about the podcast and definitely subscribe and leave a review about what you loved wherever you get your podcast, that really does help. And if you love even more, I would love love to welcome you to seriously yourself, the community. We do have some time this month where we're going to be bringing in new people and you can find that on my website at https://ingridyhelanderlmft.com/seriouslyourself-the-membership/ . Look for the tab at the top that says seriously yourself subscription and come and join us. Thanks for being here. As always, I really enjoy your company. Take good care, bye. 


Thank you for joining me for this episode of Seriouslyourself. To help treat yourself well each week, go ahead and subscribe to Seriouslyourself wherever you listen to podcasts, and please share this link with anyone you love who might be seeking a little more truth and delight in their lives. If you just can't get enough and you'd like even more goodness, you can become a part of Seriouslyourself, The Membership Community. You'll receive a monthly magazine, personal gatherings and cool little treats delivered right to your mailbox. Find out more about that on my website: https://ingridyhelanderlmft.com/seriouslyourself-the-membership/. And thanks to those who make Seriouslyourself special: our wonderful music is Midsummer from the album Flood by the fabulous Joel Helander. Seriouslyourself is produced by Particulate Media, K.O. Myers, Executive Producer. The ideas and inspirations come from beautiful humans like you, that I feel lucky to know. And I'm Ingrid Helander. Take good care of yourself. See you next time. 

Hi there, come on in. This is Seriously Yourself, the podcast and I'm Ingrid Helander. 

Hey there, hello, come on in, I'm excited that you're here with me today and I think I have a really helpful and interesting topic for you because I'm hearing about it a lot, I'm feeling it, and I think there are lots of people who right now are experiencing sort of resurgence of life, a verb, um a happiness to be social and to be part of community. Yay, yay, it feels so, so good. And I also think that for many of us, especially those who tend to have some worries there is this simultaneous sensation that happens just behind the scenes. I would say kind of just behind my shoulder, right, so let me describe what I'm talking about. Today, we're talking about that tiny little panic that we might be experiencing about different things at different times, but it comes up often. So if you have any sensations inside you that sometimes get very concerned about your life, about the world, about the way things are, then stay tuned because this podcast is really for you with great affection. 

So I realized this the other day when I was um with a group of colleagues in zoom call and we were talking about life just doing a check in. And I realized that as I would mention things in my life that felt good or optimistic or healthy or happy or for which I had gratitude, I would get almost within seconds, maybe even simultaneously a voice inside that would have a counterpoint and and the voice was a little panicky. No, I am not, I do not hear others voices. I just want to say that these are parts of me, right? I think we can all experience that there's parts of you that are like yeah, go and do this thing and then you'll hear or experience or sense in your body pretty quickly. I don't want to write or I don't feel like it, that's an example of this kind of thing. So it's a very subtle internal dialogue if you will and it's good to get used to noticing this several internal dialogue and I'll tell you why in a minute. 

So I would say something like, well you know, my family is all healthy and well and I would feel that and then I might hear and I worry about them right, okay and things are good in general, we like where we live and then I might hear though, we often are concerned or I am concerned about climate change and its impacts and you know, losing species of plant and healthy living on the planet. I do worry about that. And then I might feel something like you know, day to day things are generally calm and then this little tiny panicky part would come up with something like you know, except for the fact that many groups, even within my own community are terribly polarized right now and there are elections coming up and I fear what it will be like. Or I think yay the kids are in elementary school and daycare, they get to go back again. And then I hear the tiny panicky parts say though I'm very aware that schools are often not safe places for our children and this is how it goes. 
You know, this awareness when I'm really paying attention of the up and down, like this balancing factor inside me that feels quite concerned to the point where I can feel actually kind of like panic and if I'm not aware of it, right? And you might be noticing you do this. I know a lot of my clients and a lot of people I talk to say, yeah, that's that phenomenon that says, you know, I feel like we're all dancing and living it up on the deck of the titanic, right? Or we're all arguing about which political leader we like best while all being in the same concentration camp, for example, you know, those little kind of memes and jokes and stories and I think this is why this happens, right. That there are parts of us that want us to make sure that we know well, you know, things might be fine for you and "I" meaning this little tiny panicky part, am still kind of concerned about this now before I would take the time and feel, recognize, own, allow, some attention to go to this tiny panicky part and often people don't want attention to be directed toward their tiny panicky parts because they fear that they will take over, right. And then they may have full blown panic, right, start thinking about all of those negative things and they scare you and if you don't have any perspective with this part of you inside, you don't have a relationship with it, it truly can sort of come up and all of a sudden you realize you're breathing heavier, your heart's pounding more and you go into seriously a panic attack. 
So obviously if you have those kinds of feelings, you might want to get a little help with this and you can, you really can, but I would say if you just notice these little tiny panicky parts, these little tiny inner sensations that want your attention, it can help. For me, when I didn't realize that I sort of had more than one perspective going on inside me simultaneously, here's what would happen. I would say something like um yeah things are good, but I wouldn't feel congruent inside me or I would say, you know, we're really happy living where we are, but I wouldn't notice that there was maybe another little happening inside another little message coming to me from my psyche, from my personality, whatever you wanna call it. And so I would be like that's kind of annoying whenever I say good things, I feel nervous or stressed, right? Or like I'm not being authentic, I don't like that feeling. And so this whole inner shame system would kind of come up for me like yeah, you're not very appreciative. You know, you talk like you are happy about stuff and indeed I am, but you don't feel it all the way inside. Therefore you must not really appreciate what's going on for you. Makes sense or you're quite the pessimist, aren't you? Even though you're saying things that should sound happy, you're having a negative view of them, aren't you? And I'd be like, gosh, maybe I am. You see when we have to look at ourselves as I am as a whole, either being all this way or all that way, then we get very confused inside and we often will feel very negative about ourselves, right? I was a pessimist. I was neurotic, I was un appreciative. I wasn't grateful for all of these things that I was saying or noticing that we're good in life. When I had these other little things inside telling me things aren't all that perfect. 

So I wonder about you, do you have a running tally inside or maybe you do and you've learned to really push it away. I would say this is not necessarily in your best interest to just simply say, oh yeah, there's a part of me that could get really worried about that, but I'm choosing to ignore it completely, why do I say that's a bad idea. I'll tell you, when we choose to ignore parts of us that are deeply concerned about things, whether they're connected to our past, when we are children or teens or young adults or whatever. Whether they're connected to just sensations that carry concern. If we ignore them, they tend to get louder just as if you ignore a child, it tends to get louder, right? Mommy, you ignore mommy, you ignore mommy! Mommy! Mommy, right? It's gonna really come at you. 
And sometimes these worried parts come at us when we're trying to sleep or when we don't expect it or when we're under stress, right? And then we literally do have perhaps a full blown panic attack or what feels more like a crisis. And it needn't be that way. If we've taken the smaller moments to notice. Oh yes, I in fact am happy about my family being healthy and at the same moment there are parts of me that want me to remember that there are things that are important to me to carry concern about that impacts my family's world. 

When I listen to it that way, I can get some clarity. I can create some space inside. Does that make sense? I can take this deep breath and I go, well for sure, that makes sense, right? And I don't have to shut down any information. I don't have to ignore that the crisis of the climate is important to me. I don't have to ignore that. Political concerns matter to me. I don't have to ignore that while my life and my family's life feels safe and sound, I carry a deep concern about the lives of others that don't feel safe and sound. I don't have to ignore those things just to be quote unquote, authentically pleasant, happy upbeat. I can take those into deep consideration and I can be more effective about those things, right? When I'm not either panicking from them or ignoring them completely, I can have an impact. I can do something to impact the political system or the environment or others lives around me that I care about without denying that many, many, many, many if not all really, most things in my life feel really great. I don't have to succumb to messages of like, wow, you know, life is good. And then I have this little voice in the back that says and it's really hard for me and many of us to make it financially these days. That's very difficult. It feels like a setup like we just can't win. Okay, both of those things can be true. I don't have to rule either out and I don't have to feel all caught up in my tiny panicky part. Nor do I have to ignore because it is real. That part cares deeply about my life and the wellness and safety of others lives too and it wants me to know that. So when I take a minute, I take a breath and I let it know I hear you, I hear you Yeah, and that is a different experience than the good one I'm having when I think about how well things are, when I celebrate wellness, when I celebrate health, when I celebrate having enough to eat, when I celebrate fun times and all of this rejoining and getting together in community again, which we so love and we so need.

I hope that's helpful for you. If you have any tiny panicky parts, go ahead and let me know, I'm interested to hear your questions and if you want to go a little deeper and if you'd really like to go deeper, I would recommend highly my community Seriously Yourself. It is a place where you can share, you can get more of these kind of offerings every month in print, in live coaching calls and you get some sweet tender, wonderful gifts in the mail just for you, take good care of yourself and all those tiny panicky parts and celebrate what you know is good in your life today. Thanks for being with me. I'll talk with you soon, bye. 


Thank you for joining me for this episode of Seriouslyourself. To help treat yourself well each week, go ahead and subscribe to Seriouslyourself wherever you listen to podcasts, and please share this link with anyone you love who might be seeking a little more truth and delight in their lives. If you just can't get enough and you'd like even more goodness, you can become a part of Seriouslyourself, The Membership Community. You'll receive a monthly magazine, personal gatherings and cool little treats delivered right to your mailbox. Find out more about that on my website: https://ingridyhelanderlmft.com/seriouslyourself-the-membership/. And thanks to those who make Seriouslyourself special: our wonderful music is Midsummer from the album Flood by the fabulous Joel Helander. Seriouslyourself is produced by Particulate Media, K.O. Myers, Executive Producer. The ideas and inspirations come from beautiful humans like you, that I feel lucky to know. And I'm Ingrid Helander. Take good care of yourself. See you next time. 

Hi there, come on in. This is Seriously Yourself, the podcast and I'm Ingrid Helander. 

Hi there, come on in, how are you? Hey I have a question for you today, for our episode. The question is do you think of yourself as wise? Yeah, really think about it. Do you think of yourself as wise? Now I know a few of you and I can hear you saying well I'm a wiseacre or I'm a wise guy or I'm a wisecracker. Funny, but take a minute, really. Do you think of yourself as a wise being? That's our topic this month in our seriously yourself community and it's really wonderful to start looking at what we know about wisdom and how we share wisdom, what messages we've taken in about wisdom or being wise, what burdens there are around considering oneself as a wise being. 
I know a lot of people who would instantly say no way new and I also know quite a number of people who would pretty quickly own Yeah, I feel I feel wise, I do feel wise, I wonder about you, today let's look at it. 
So wisdom is often confused with related words like intelligence, knowledge or understanding right? Really, the simplest way that I've learned to differentiate the from each other is that wisdom is the big picture, right? Wisdom is the whole, information you need, right? But it's not the whole, you use information if you are wise, right? You can use it, you can make sense out of it. Knowledge is just the information, okay and understanding it is just the ability to take it in, Does that all make sense? I think lots of times we confuse being intelligent with being wise and and they are not at all necessarily synonymous. 

You know, people talk about common sense and book knowledge, you know that person has lots of book knowledge, but no common sense. I think that's sort of stepping a toe into this idea a little bit like yeah, you can, you can know a lot and not really be expressing or living within wisdom, wisdom is really the making sense of in using the knowledge and the understanding and I think the word making sense there is super important because if you can make sense of something, it's kind of, you can sense it and sensing comes from using your senses, right? It's more of a body thing, if you say I make sense with my mind, that's kind of just, I think about it right? Or I can rationalize it or I can take it in, I can understand it right, it's in my language, it's in terms that I get, but that doesn't mean that it makes sense for you in a way that will be transmitted as wisdom makes sense, does it? 

Yeah, so think about someone right now who maybe you consider to be a source of wisdom for you or who you believe to be wise, maybe it was a grandparent or a parent or maybe there's an author or a leader or a spiritual teacher of some kind that you really consider to be an elder for you, right? Um, and I don't mean just someone who's older, but someone who carries wisdom.  I was, I was asked when I was like 45 to be, I don't even think I was 45 yet to be an elder in a church community I was in at the time and I was a little offended. And another part of part of me was very flattered. It was a very wonderful offer, but I was like, are you saying I'm old. How old am I feel silly about that? 

So don't get hung up on that stuff. It's not about that, it's really more about making sense, being in your senses around what you know. So do you have someone, maybe, maybe Gandhi is wise for you or you know, christ or buddha or you know, your fifth grade teacher, your grandpa John, I don't know. And then try to imagine what it is about them that you found wise. Maybe they had a gentle way of showing you things about life, right, pointing out where you might trip and fall along the way or where you might find nourishment. 

There are so many ways to transmit wisdom, right? It's something that we are, I think as humans, it keeps us surviving just like the animal world, right? Animals really know and transmit to one another, what is safe and what is not safe to eat, that's kind of a wisdom, isn't it? In some ways, maybe people are less wise, we get so hooked on our ideas that we don't allow them to settle into our bodies so that we can sense them. Believe what is in our bodies. That makes sense. So I take this from uh what's ready? I apologize. I don't remember the author, but um they were talking about, you can know and have the information and even understand that, say cigarette smoking is really bad for you, but until you sense it in your body somehow, if you want to smoke, you'll smoke, right? So not to smoke, we might say, well that's a wise choice. Never to have started maybe was a wise choice, but that comes from something. 

So how are you wise? You know, we like to shy away from that question. It's kind of embarrassing, right? Like what kind of egomaniac would say that they were "wise", you know? And in fact even Socrates himself who certainly many considered to be very wise said the only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing. And I think that's very wise, that keeps the mind open. It keeps the mind curious. And I do think again, it does point to the body because no, you know nothing right? But the body senses right? 

I could know it's safe to walk around my building generally, but I'm telling you if it's dark out and I started to walk and I got a sensation in the body of danger. I best listen, right, maybe it's nothing, maybe it's a bear. I don't know. So here's the thing, you know, talking about it on this podcast on seriously yourself. I think you have wisdom. I think you are wise. You know, we're all only human and we're certainly all subject to all kinds of questionable information, all kinds of questionable knowledge. But you still, I believe have the capacity to stay curious, as Socrates says, unknowing and makes sense. And I think in that way that kind of wisdom belongs so, so particularly to you, your own take on things how it's felt for you, what you've gleaned from your own life, experience, what you have to teach others. You know, it's so important. It has nothing to do with your SAT score or your rank in your high school or what college you went to. I don't believe that. I think some of the wisest things I've heard are from little children, some of them intentional, some of them accidental and some of them just like profound right little kids say the most amazing things, amazing things. They notice and they feel and that tends to come out in their words.

 I always love and I've probably told you before about my nephew Otto who's now a teenager, but back when he was like two instead of using, I don't know, he would say, "I can't know", you'd ask him about something and he'd say, "I can't know". And I think that's a bit of wisdom. He couldn't know, he didn't have it in there to be able to know the answer. Yeah, Little Socrates we had there, we didn't even know it. So you don't have to know everything to be wise and you don't have to be old to be wise and you don't have to be narcissistic or egotistical to be wise. You just have to feel into that body, use your senses combined with what you have experienced and what you've taken in and with curiosity and patience and care express that when the time is right, right? 
Or just live in it and people will witness your wisdom. I think I really want to encourage you to do that because I don't have your wisdom, you know, and if you make it uniquely your own, if you don't just quote what you heard on this program or the news or even in that book, but you feel into it and kind of, you know, mix it around in there with what you've lived through and keep an open mind and heart and notice what is important. I think your wisdom is going to show through and I think the world needs you. Yeah. So how are you wise? Where is your wisdom today? What does it tell you to do or be take good care of you stay in touch with yourself and me too. Hey, and if you enjoyed this episode, please, please drop me a little review where you're listening, it is most appreciated. And if you're thinking of even more goodness, please look into the seriously yourself membership. We are going to be opening up for more members this fall and I would love to have you there, take good care of yourself. Don't be a wise guy. Talk to you soon. Bye. 

Thank you for joining me for this episode of Seriouslyourself. To help treat yourself well each week, go ahead and subscribe to Seriouslyourself wherever you listen to podcasts, and please share this link with anyone you love who might be seeking a little more truth and delight in their lives. If you just can't get enough and you'd like even more goodness, you can become a part of Seriouslyourself, The Membership Community. You'll receive a monthly magazine, personal gatherings and cool little treats delivered right to your mailbox. Find out more about that on my website: https://ingridyhelanderlmft.com/seriouslyourself-the-membership/. And thanks to those who make Seriouslyourself special: our wonderful music is Midsummer from the album Flood by the fabulous Joel Helander. Seriouslyourself is produced by Particulate Media, K.O. Myers, Executive Producer. The ideas and inspirations come from beautiful humans like you, that I feel lucky to know. And I'm Ingrid Helander. Take good care of yourself. See you next time. 

Hi there, come on in. This is Seriously Yourself, the podcast and I'm Ingrid Helander. 


Hi, come on in, how are you? I'm hoping you're busy. Are you busy? You're really, really busy. You probably are busy. Yeah, I'm recording this for September. It's September now, and I'm guessing you're busy, because everyone I talked to when I talk to them, they're like, I'm so busy, but how are you? I'm busy. Are you feeling, busy? It's too busy, I'm tired, it's so busy. Yeah, busy. 

So this is a good episode, even if it's not September when you're listening to this to take it in because it could be helpful for another time when you might be really busy. And I can't tell you that you shouldn't be busy. In fact, it's probably a great thing that you're busy. It shows that you're alive, you're well, you're out there, you're doing things. Yeah, it's not bad, but there's something about end of summer, beginning of fall along with a few other times of the year, but in a unique way this time of year brings out a certain flavor of busy. Does it feel like that for you? I think for many, many, many, many people if they have families especially or if they themselves are attending school or in the school system or in a business that is connected to a typical school schedule sometimes offering different kinds of lessons or things for children or anything that connects to school. Right, it ramps up in September, End of August beginning of September and then we're off to the races. And so in fact, there is this literal increase in activity, an increase in scheduling and in expectations that have been somewhat released during the summer. 
Even if you're not on that particular schedule with your work or your family say you're retired. I don't think it's uncommon for people to experience this ramping up this like, "oh, got to do now that it's coming into September" because that's what you did for many, many years of your childhood right into young adulthood. Talk about a habit, right? The habit is September is busy. So as you do that, let's take some time so that we don't feel like our heads are gonna explode in September because nobody needs that. Right? 

So I'm gonna offer you today on seriously yourself a little exercise that you can try to help you stay healthy in your body in your mind, even when the expectations and realities of September ramp up for you, okay? 
If you can start by just taking a moment this week and notice how often are you giving yourself messages that you are busy right? Now, some people are very, very aware of their inner dialogue or some would say that overthinking or the voice in their head, right? And other people are really not. I'm not sure if maybe some folks don't have it as much. I I think if you're a person that often hears the running dialogue of themselves in their head and is aware of it, you might be a little jealous of those that don't seem to have that experience, but I don't know, I think probably most of us do have that. If we actually stop and we notice what was just going on inside me. 
But if you have a comment on that, please please let me know. I think it's interesting. So go back again and notice what you hear yourself say to yourself about your pacing, your schedule, your obligations, your expectations and so on. And notice how often you might hear yourself say I'm too busy or I'm so busy or things are so busy when I get busy. I tend to you so with it, I don't know. I think part of me really wants to emphasize that, right? 

Yours may sound more like I am just exhausted. I'm so tired, I'll never catch up. Okay, so take a minute then, when you've kind of gotten it that you're doing this to yourself. Do you do it when you first wake up in the morning as you're trying to get ready to go when someone reminds you about something, is it last thing at night when you're like, oh no, what do I have going on tomorrow? Is it maybe a running tally all day? 
I'm not saying you don't need that. You very well might need that, but we want to help it be as conscious and soothing as possible, right? We don't want it to be a painful experience for you. So after you've determined when you're saying I'm so busy or if you're saying it and you might, by the way, be saying it to friends and family. Also catch those, then ask yourself what happens in my body or around my body sensations when I hear myself say I'm so busy or it's so busy or things are so busy or we're so busy. Maybe even as I say, that you get an idea of what it feels like in your body when this is going on, when that word comes up too much.
You know, for example, your head might go kind of foggy, your shoulders might take your heart or chest might feel heavy, you might feel just a malaise come over you, your heart might start pounding, you know, like, oh my gosh, I gotta get on this, I got stuff to do or it might sink. Yeah, you might want to jot down what you feel. That's a something it isn't just a feeling that you need to ignore, nor is it something you have to sink into. It's just a noticing, right? Oh, busy equals this in my body. Okay? And consciously, I would say when you do feel that send a loving, appreciative or compassionate breath, if it's possible to wherever you do feel the result of I'm too busy. 

And as you breathe and experience that sensation, you might want to just listen, what comes up? Do you hear more? Do you see images? Do you get more sensation? What happens? Do you get a reminder of a certain time period of your life? Do you have a part that shows you your list? Well, here's your list and in fact you are too busy. Do you have a part that shows you a list of regrets? Maybe? Maybe there isn't mistakes. You feel you're making around your schedule, right? Maybe someone has pressed your schedule upon you and you disagree. Takes you back to fourth grade, sitting at the kitchen counter, listening to your mom tell you what homework you had that night. Yeah, wherever it takes you let it take you if you can and just jot it down. If you have a moment, I know you're busy, but if you could, it would be great. You're gonna find things that I could not possibly predict.

And that's why I love, I love working with people because you know, you hear a lot of similar stories, we are certainly way more connected than not. But you also hear these these unique intricacies that make each person who they are, you know, their own little little nuances and experiences and wiring. That is so fabulous. So, if you do come up with anything great from that and you want to share it with me, DM me, send me a message, I'd love to hear. The other thing. You can then notice is that that if you are really telling people a lot, I'm so busy. Maybe you wake up and you just mutter it out loud at the kitchen sink or when anybody ask you, how are you? I'm so busy. I'm too busy. I'm busy. Right. There may be a secondary purpose for the part of you that's saying that, right, what could that be? Well, it's going to be up to you, but take a check, it could be an indirect way of you asking for help. Maybe you have four kids to get to four different sports in the afternoon and you feel like everybody else also has the same problem and you feel like you have no right to ask for help, but frankly you can't do it because you're only one person. And so rather than feeling capable of reaching out, asking a spouse, a friend, a family member for help, changing the schedule in any meaningful way for yourself or another solution. The part of you just keeps kind of shouting out loud, I'm so busy, I'm just too busy, hoping for a rescue. Please help me. It's saying please please come to the rescue. I'm underwater here. That would make sense. Yeah, it may be just an expression of frustration. You know that you are just legitimately too busy. Your employer just plopped a new assignment on you, your kids just started school, right? Some of your family started a new job. Um someone's beginning driver's ed, I don't know, whatever it is, you can do the math and it doesn't work right? I cannot do this. There are not enough hours in the day and there is not enough of me, right? When we get those clones, it's gonna be awesome. Tell you what? Probably not. But you know, don't you wish the other thing that I'm so busy or I'm too busy can be doing for you or trying to do for you is creating a little internal reminder to you that you need to stay on task, right? 

So it's almost like a little pressure button that goes off every now and again to say don't lose track, because there's a lot now you could do that differently and we'll go over that in a sec. But it could just be like a little pop up timer or a little alarm bell really "stay on task, stay on task, there's a lot going on" and what it says to you is, you know, I'm so busy, okay. 

And finally, and it's not finally because you very well could have things that are unique to you. But the other one that I think of is that it could just be a bad habit, right? A very ineffective kind of a little habit that you've developed a part of you started doing and then you just kept doing it and again those habits can be connected to times of year when you needed those habits, right? So if you needed, when you were a high school junior to stay on task and to be so busy because of your lifestyle. Then you may have begun that habit and you may still have it whenever September rolls around, so you could look at that, it's kind of fun really. 

So whatever busy means in your system is okay, alright? But you do have the capacity to work with parts of your body, your mind, your soma that have been dragged along and have dragged too busy forward from your childhood. You may very well need to ask for help. You may very well need to ask for help, right? You might need to say to your kid one sport this year. I love you. But unless you can find a ride, my dear eighth grader, I can't be in another place. I just can't. Right, You might want to look at what doesn't feel like your choice. 
So you may have added activities, right? And then forget, oh, I want this. And so then you're like, oh I'm so busy even though you know, you're doing something that when you get there or tune in or do it gives you great refreshment, right? So maybe busy has become a word, that's logging you down. That's not the word I want. Maybe busy is a word that is dragging you down, pulling you down, but isn't really what you mean? Right? So maybe if you notice, yeah, I'm busy, but I love going to the book group on Tuesdays. I'm so glad we started again. I love being at the soccer field with you know, jimmy because how fun is that? I love, you know that work is busier because I was actually kind of you know, getting tired of what I was doing whatever it is. But if you don't feel that you have the choice and busy keeps entering your mind, you might just want to say, is that what I really mean? Or do I want to say I'm more lively than usual or I'm more active than usual, right? You can really look at how words impact what you feel about what you're doing. 

So those are just a few ideas, I hope they're helpful, I find for me they are really helpful because my body responds to words without me even recognizing barely that I've said them to myself and so slowing down and being more conscious and feeling into them is a great resource. Let me know what you find out if you want to play with this more. We do this kind of work every single month in the Seriously Yourself Membership and it is great fun. There are abundant treats and deliciousness for you. So wherever you live, feel free to check into that on my website and come along, we would love to have you. But you know, in the meantime it's kind of busy. So I gotta run, bye.

 Thank you for joining me for this episode of Seriouslyourself. To help treat yourself well each week, go ahead and subscribe to Seriouslyourself wherever you listen to podcasts, and please share this link with anyone you love who might be seeking a little more truth and delight in their lives. If you just can't get enough and you'd like even more goodness, you can become a part of Seriouslyourself, The Membership Community. You'll receive a monthly magazine, personal gatherings and cool little treats delivered right to your mailbox. Find out more about that on my website: https://ingridyhelanderlmft.com/seriouslyourself-the-membership/. And thanks to those who make Seriouslyourself special: our wonderful music is Midsummer from the album Flood by the fabulous Joel Helander. Seriouslyourself is produced by Particulate Media, K.O. Myers, Executive Producer. The ideas and inspirations come from beautiful humans like you, that I feel lucky to know. And I'm Ingrid Helander. Take good care of yourself. See you next time. 

Hi there, come on in. This is Seriouslyourself, the podcast, and I'm Ingrid Helander.
Hey there, come on in. Welcome to Seriouslyourself. I'm really happy you're here today. I have an interesting topic that has been coming up a lot for me lately, and it's about addiction. Addiction... hmm... I never have thought of myself as a person really susceptible, honestly, to addictions. Well, not entirely, but I would say that the kinds of addictions - this sort of scary addictions that we hear about a lot like opioid addiction or alcohol addiction or other drug addictions, I don't really like the feeling of being terribly under the influence. Painkillers seldom work well for me, some even jumped me the other direction and make me feel hyper and have more pain, and it's always been that way since I was a little kid. I was raised in a family where ,you know, you were taught to be pretty afraid -  I think is the word - of all things that would alter you too much. You know, I don't know if that was good or bad. But at any rate, it was never really a part of who I, you know had grown up to be, and so I didn't ever really think about addiction much. But the last couple of months I've been dealing with an addiction in my family and really taking a serious look at myself and what it means to have addiction.

I can tell you that I definitely have had times in my life and probably even right now where I am certainly addicted to caffeine, to coffee. How about you? I don't know if you drink coffee or maybe a strong tea, you know that if you quit suddenly you're probably going to go through 3-5 days of nasty headache and irritability. And it's a very particular feeling, and you know it pretty quickly like, oh man, I haven't had my coffee! And it can make you really ill, you know, the withdrawal symptoms from caffeine can be terrible. So yeah, is that an addiction? Absolutely.

We know that the definition of addiction is a compulsive, chronic physiological or psychological need for a habit-forming substance, behavior or activity, having harmful physical, psychological, or social effects and typically causing well-defined symptoms such as anxiety, irritability, tremors or nausea upon withdrawal or abstinence. That's Miriam Webster.

Yeah. So the purpose of the podcast today is to get us really thinking about that in Seriouslyourself, it's not to minimize significant, serious, life-threatening addictions or any of the people that are going through them or any of those who love those folks. Okay? It's not to minimize that. And it's certainly not to pathologize "normal,"  because that's got a really broad meaning for me, but behaviors that we should not be concerned about. I'm not trying to make normal, everyday, don't worry about it behaviors into something that would be an illness or sickness or a problem. 

So having said that, I do think though that it's really worth it, when you're trying to be more seriously yourself, to look at what addictiveness, right? Or what addictions might you have. One thing I'm learning in dealing with a loved one's addiction is that I have parts of me that are co-addicted with them, right? I don't like them to feel or act off. And so I have certain behaviors that I will repeat in order to maintain them, right? That's that you know that enabler kind of a thing. I hate the word enabler because it makes you feel so lousy, so I won't use it here. But you know, it's that kind of a thing. Yeah? 

So what about you? What do you engage in that might have an extra little bit of a hold and negative impact for you? My favorite current definition of addiction is by a woman named Karen Perlmutter who's an addiction expert, and she defines addiction as: The gradual development of an (inaccurate) belief that I am incapable of experiencing discomfort and therefore I must pursue comfort at all cost. Right? This deep, honest belief in the body - in the mind, I guess that the addict wholly believes (though it is not true) that they cannot experience any kind of discomfort. 

And if you know someone who is really addicted to whatever they're addicted to and you look at them and you're like: Really? Really? You have to do this thing or you have to have that? Yeah, they feel they do. They're not  - they're not kidding. Okay? So if you think about that definition, which I really like, and you apply it to your own behaviors and activities, it can be so helpful. And here's why: It can show you where you're not attending to parts of your discomfort in a way that's helpful. It can show you where you're feeling out of control around discomfort. 

Using that definition for everyday behaviors that you feel compelled to do really can help you to know if you are entering dangerous territory or what the difference is between behavior that is soothing, that is helpful, that is internally supportive and behavior or practices that have a negative addictive quality. Right? So you might say, well, I'm addicted to meditation Ingrid. I have to do it every morning or I am off.  And I would say that's an interesting one to look at, because it is a wonderful practice and you will gain a ton from meditating and you probably aren't going to have negative consequences from meditating, and you probably won't have serious immediate symptoms - I don't think - if you stop meditating. However, if you meditate in such a way that is because you absolutely cannot stand the discomfort you are in, right? And without being able to do that immediately in that way and in disregard of everyone and everything, then you might have an addiction, right? Good or bad? I'm not sure. But you know, so I'm taking something that we normally would think of as just really super great, right? I know people that do really good things like exercise, but from an addictive standpoint. So if they don't exercise their thoughts, feelings become so overwhelming for them that they have to exercise in lieu of absolutely everything and it takes over their lives and sometimes has negative health consequences. 

So for me, I was thinking about, well certainly, you know, if I stopped drinking coffee tomorrow, I would have a headache for a little bit. Now if somebody said, you know, there's a huge coffee problem - I don't know what it would be, but you cannot have coffee again or even caffeine, right? I wouldn't lose my mind over that. I wouldn't be like, this cannot be, I won't be able to handle my life. Okay? But you know, if somebody took my phone away tomorrow, I may have similar thoughts. I was recently with a friend whom I adore, and she had dropped her phone in the ocean and then was trying to go about doing her work, doing her business even of like getting a new phone and so on. But she didn't know the area, and she didn't have GPS with her. And so getting together with anyone or even to certain stores was enormously hard. We are (so really aren't we? Many of us) addicted to our phones, addicted to having a thought, you know, I wonder about this and then Googling it immediately and sometimes when we can't do that we get really frustrated. I know if I'm trying to think of a word or a movie or a song or something, I can't remember some fact. It can drive me purely nuts if I can't get to Google to ask. Now can I get used to that feeling? Yes. Could I tolerate it? Yeah. But you've certainly seen the videos  - and if you haven't, they're interesting to watch - of like young teenagers who have their phone removed and they go through withdrawal symptoms, literal physical panicky withdrawal. They can't imagine not having that tool in their hand really as part of their body and their consciousness that they're going to experience so much discomfort without it. Right? 

So the next time, I would say, that you're experiencing some discomfort in this process of becoming more seriously yourself, notice what you reach for, notice what you're thinking. "I need. I need to do this now." And then stay compassionately curious and ask yourself: Do I need to repeat that behavior? Do I need to look at my email first thing every morning? Do I need to play that game on the phone? Do I need to call that particular person to see if they're okay right now? Do I need to eat this thing, drink this thing? Have this thing? Yeah. And then you can decide, I don't need it. I can enjoy it or I can use something healthy to soothe, but I'm okay. And maybe, you can even notice what is the actual discomfort you're trying to rid yourself up or you believe you can't handle. What is it? What's the worst that's gonna happen? And let yourself go there, not because you're going there, but because some part of you already believes it's going to happen. Does that make sense? And do it gently and kindly. And if you find that you're having, you know, truly serious problem with it and it's really hard for you to take it seriously - because of course the addiction will say no, no, no, no, no I'm not. I am not a problem for you. I'm your savior, right? The addiction has that sneaky way of doing that. 

Especially things like alcohol and drugs, because they have more of a chemical component, even than the juicing of our own body, right? When we satisfy a craving to get rid of a discomfort, right? So if we do that psychologically, I'm sure there's still a chemical happening in our bodies. But if we do it with a drug, then it's even more so makes sense. Yeah. 

So I just want to bring that up. I think especially after the pandemic, we are seeing tons and tons and tons of addictions that have popped to the surface more; that have not been able to be seen by others because people were quarantined. So they got out of hand, that have not been able to get the resources they needed because of also quarantines and illness, staffing all kinds of issues, Right? 

So just offering tons and tons of patience to yourself and to others who are experiencing addiction right now, taking the time to understand your own and offering it curiosity and care. And get help if you need. Reach out. We all want to feel good, and we're all capable of handling especially emotional discomfort with enough help and enough compassion. 

Take good, good care of you. Take a deep breath, stay really patient and get curious. What are your addictions, my friends? Talk to you next time. Bye. 

Thank you for joining me for this episode of Seriouslyourself. To help treat yourself well each week, go ahead and subscribe to Seriouslyourself wherever you listen to podcasts, and please share this link with anyone you love who might be seeking a little more truth and delight in their lives. If you just can't get enough and you'd like even more goodness, you can become a part of Seriouslyourself, The Membership Community. You'll receive a monthly magazine, personal gatherings and cool little treats delivered right to your mailbox. Find out more about that on my website: https://ingridyhelanderlmft.com/seriouslyourself-the-membership/. And thanks to those who make Seriouslyourself special: our wonderful music is Midsummer from the album Flood by the fabulous Joel Helander. Seriouslyourself is produced by Particulate Media, K.O. Myers, Executive Producer. The ideas and inspirations come from beautiful humans like you, that I feel lucky to know. And I'm Ingrid Helander. Take good care of yourself. See you next time. 

Hi there, come on in. This is Seriously Yourself, the podcast and I'm Ingrid Helander. 

Hi there. Hi, come on in, how are ya? Oh, today I have a kind of a yummy topic I think and you can take what you need from it, but I think fundamentally it's about being open to receive and to listen inside to you while you also notice what's coming towards you and for you and for a lot of people that might sound kind of woo like woo what are you talking about? But I've noticed that the more I pay attention to my inner world, often using the skill or the practice of internal family systems therapy. And I think for a lot of people using their own belief systems, the concept of the spiritual life and connection to that might be another concept to draw on as we're talking today or just nature and what does nature hold for us and have to teach us about the life here and our world and it's kind of wonderful. 

So I have a story for you recently, I got to experience time at Kripalu which is a yoga retreat center, lovely, restful, beautiful place in great Barrington, Massachusetts and it's surrounded and in the Berkshires of Western Mass and is just lovely there. And I happened to be there on a beautiful summer day and I decided to go down and walk the labyrinth. Which you may or may not have walked labyrinths. I never did really much until I was probably in my 40's and since then have grown quite an affection for them. They're not mazes, they're not things you have to figure out. They lead you in on a very winding turning contemplative path and they weave you back out and I love them for that reason. And they give you a space to really be with yourself, be with your surroundings, listen deeply, it's meditative, right? You can breathe and just be. And in that space sometimes things come, sometimes you get beautiful messages or just a sense of well being. And a labyrinth isn't something that I would rush through. It's something that I would go very methodically, restfully, mindfully through so it can take some time. 

So on a particular afternoon I decided I was going to go down and treat myself to the labyrinth and I entered the labyrinth and began my walk and just, you know, trying to be aware of what was around me, the sky, the sun, the breezes that touched me. I noticed little purple clover and cute little buttercups along the way, an occasional bird. The labyrinth was surrounded by I think they're used probably like a fir shrub and some of them actually had other fir trees growing right in them. Like they were trying to take over sort of a blue spruce sort of coming in and out of this original shrub that had been planted and I just thought that I've never seen anything quite like that. And I thought it was kind of fascinating and I wondered about, you know, at what point might that just become like a metamorphosis into this new fir tree and would that even happen? So I just was kind of thinking about that and being amused by everything I saw. And as I came around one of the many curves and turns, I noticed what looked to me like a black and white butterfly probably four feet away from me to the left on the path. And as I looked at it and thought about moving toward it, though it wasn't exactly on my path, but it was near as I approached closer, I I was startled by this, I heard this click the snap and realized it was it was a jumping insect. So I came later to find out it was probably a black winged grasshopper which I'm not particularly familiar with for some reason. So it jumped and made this loud clicking sound that took my breath away for a moment and I thought was kind of fun. And then I noticed it had leaped to the other side of the path, but forward from me, maybe a foot from the path, but maybe four ft 5 ft in front of me. So I was kind of excited that I could see it again and maybe it would do the same thing and it had its wings open so I could spot it pretty easily. So as I kept on the path walking sort of slowly toward it, it once again this snap happened and I was really happy about it. It was like, hey, we're playing here. And then I noticed it leaped over the path and went sort of around the next curve and I knew I would be coming around to it again. And as I did so hey, once again there it was and we had a little game going almost and it was so fun and I had some time in between that moment and when I might find it again, I started getting curious about, well what what do I want to know about this, this interaction, this gift of nature here, what, what's what's going to come from this? And I watched it, it hopped again and I watched how straight its lines were. And it was just crossing over paths that I knew I was going to be winding through much more slowly. And I thought to myself, maybe maybe the message is, you know, to take a direct path, not to wait around for this slow thing, but you know, jump over, take the straight line, take the B line. And pretty quickly had this really strong sensation of don't move right toward the grasshopper with that energy of the straight line, the quick path because I could have right, I I could have certainly just walked right over to it and chased it around and you know, enjoyed it, snapping and hopping and see what it did. But I had such a strong feeling of you came here to walk the path you love. You came down to the labyrinth to engage in your process to do what you enjoy, do that. And the grasshopper at that point was on the opposite side of where the path was leading me. And so I thought, well yeah, I'm gonna keep going here. And I kept walking and meandering around. It was taking me farther and farther away from my new friend and I walked around and came around a corner and all of a sudden I recognized oh I might be getting a little bit closer to where I left the grasshopper and I was a little happy about that. But I wasn't really close enough to where I had left it to imagine that my walking would create that same jump again. And it came to me very clearly, you know, you're on the path you love. And if you just stay there maybe the grasshopper will just come to you. That delight will just come to you. And honestly, no joke. The minute the thought entered my mind and started to leave I hear and it was the same grasshopper. But it had left in between and was on the other side of me, right beside where I walked right past it and it took my breathe, at that time I just literally started laughing out loud, luckily I was alone on the left Corinth because I went, oh, it was so fun. What a delight, right? This little bug for some reason that was representing a sense of fun and and a wakefulness and and surprise came to me. I didn't have to go the B line, I didn't have to go jerking about the labyrinth, which was not my paths purpose to walk the labyrinth. I could simply be and it would come to me. 

So I ended up walking through the rest of the labyrinth and you know, saying goodbye and thank you to my grasshopper friend who stayed there,I think. I had an image in my mind, how fun would it be if it just hopped with me all the way back up to the residents building. But you know, that was my, that was just for fun. That was a fun fantasy. I had already gotten what I needed from the grasshopper. It's gift of be patient, stay on your path, be where you love, do what you love and you know, others that want to play with you that want to delight you and be delighted by you will come to you. 

Yeah, so I'm curious today about experiences that you have maybe when you're in nature, maybe when you're just in a quiet, meditative like state or on a walk, What comes for you? What have you learned from your time when you're not really trying to make anything happen. I find that often that creative open space where the best ideas, inspirations, comforts come from. And so I'm just inviting you if it isn't a practice for you, which I think for most of us it probably isn't, I don't know to take those moments and allow whatever is there to come to you because it will surprise you, you know, just as the crack, that crack of that grasshopper was a beautiful surprise for me. I think these little gifts surprise us in a great way when you're outside, take the time to notice when you're paying attention to your breath, your body, your strong emotions, take the time to notice. It's all here for you to gain joy. It really brings such joy wishing you great joy today. 
If you'd like a little more joy in your day your week, please make sure to sign up for my newsletter. You can do that easily at my website https://ingridyhelanderlmft.com/ and consider while you're there, taking a look at the seriously yourself membership each and every month is so wonderful new delights insights, inspiration practices for you that come to you in ways that you can really absorb and use them. There's beautiful written materials that come right right to your mailbox. There's amazing coaching calls that are personally led by me. You're not going to get stuck with a recording and have to, you know, file that away and hope you get to the class someday. It's all live and in person and you get personal care and attention, personal notes from me in the mail along with lovely little gifts to inspire you and remind you not only of what you're learning is becoming more seriously yourself, but how important you are and what a difference it makes to the world and your own community as you show up. So I hope to see you soon. If you like what you hear in these podcasts, do me a giant favor and drop a review that would mean the world to me. If you're on Spotify or Apple or amazon, just drop me a a little quick review saying what you liked. And if you have any questions, you can always reach out to me through direct messages or email. Great to be with you today. Watch for those grasshoppers, they are always around. Take good, good care, talk to you soon. Bye now.

Thank you for joining me for this episode of Seriouslyourself. To help treat yourself well each week, go ahead and subscribe to Seriouslyourself wherever you listen to podcasts, and please share this link with anyone you love who might be seeking a little more truth and delight in their lives. If you just can't get enough and you'd like even more goodness, you can become a part of Seriouslyourself, The Membership Community. You'll receive a monthly magazine, personal gatherings and cool little treats delivered right to your mailbox. Find out more about that on my website: https://ingridyhelanderlmft.com/seriouslyourself-the-membership/. And thanks to those who make Seriouslyourself special: our wonderful music is Midsummer from the album Flood by the fabulous Joel Helander. Seriouslyourself is produced by Particulate Media, K.O. Myers, Executive Producer. The ideas and inspirations come from beautiful humans like you, that I feel lucky to know. And I'm Ingrid Helander. Take good care of yourself. See you next time. 



 

Hi there, come on in. This is Seriously Yourself, the podcast and I'm Ingrid Helander. 

Hey, hello, come on in, how are you? I am glad that you are here and I hope you're feeling well. Today I'm talking about heartache, ouch, heart ache. Have you had that experience heartache? I don't know if it's exactly the same as feeling a broken heart. I kind of feel like that's different, That feels more acute, you know, like someone has just slapped you across the face and said, I never want to see you again and oh my heart was just broken where they said something really cruel and I had a broken heart, I guess that's similar. 

And I'm talking about like when you focus on your breathing and you notice your heart and you might or might not have the sensation of heaviness or aching or kind of pain like. Do you know what I mean? Do you ever feel that way? I think I carry a lot of feeling in my heart. I know what I'm working with clients lots of times they're feeling will go right to their gut. They'll say, oh I just feel almost nauseous right now and I know that feeling too. And perhaps you do as well, that might be a more predominant sensation. 

But for a lot of people, when I ask, how do you feel, they'll point to their chest square in the center and they're like, it's always right here. And it can reverberate and be all around their chest sometimes up into the shoulders and down into the belly. That area of our anatomy, sure does carry a lot of sensation. When I first started doing internal family systems model, which is a more somatic model of therapy where you do pay attention to what your body tells you what your body feels like. We were all sitting in a circle and the man who created the model, Richard Schwartz was guiding us to pay attention to our hearts with curiosity and I got to tell you my heart was aching, so bad. It felt really like if you could just, if if you're in a seated position, you just, your your heart was so heavy that you just folded down onto your knees with this aching feeling like, ow ow ow.  And we were probably 40 of us sitting around in a circle listening to him, you know, ask us to be curious about this different kinds of sensations from the heart. And another part of me was sort of thinking, "holy cow, I wonder if I'm okay. This really, really hurts. Like maybe though I'm curious and we're doing this exercise and it's all perfectly fine and we're supposed to be just curious and interested. Maybe I'm having, like a coronary, you know, like maybe this is a heart attack" and I'm just sitting here going, huh? I wonder what's happening. I wonder what my heart wants me to know when maybe the heart wants me to go to the emergency room. Now. Now, as it turns out, I have a very healthy heart and my heart was not advising that I go to the emergency room, but I wasn't used to paying a whole lot of attention to what my heart felt like, right? Unless it was basically jumping out of my chest in some weird arrhythmia, which I had often as a kid and a young adult, or it was pounding unnecessarily hard or necessarily hard from exercise. I didn't really notice it, I didn't pay much attention. 

But boy, in that moment when we were sitting in that circle and we were paying attention, I recognized there was a lot going on there. It really hurt. It felt heavy, it felt like a squeeze almost, but not the good kind that you get when you get a hug, but like the squeeze of a fist, maybe the kind where your fingernails dig into your palm, was that kind of a feeling. And the more I focus toward my heart, the more I was trying to get it to relax a little bit and the more I was trying to get it to relax a little bit, the more it actually tightened and hurt and sent out feelings of yearning and frustration and confusion and sadness and grief. 

You know, our hearts are a little brain. I don't even think they're a little brain. I think they're quite a sophisticated and magnificent part of our mind and they hold so much information if we just are quiet enough to listen. And honestly brave enough courage comes from the word heart and I think you need courage to listen to one's heart. It's not easy and it can feel really terrible, like maybe you're having a heart attack. 

What I discovered in that first time listening and paying attention to my heart was that I had stored up a lot of hardship. You know, just parts of me taking on the pain of life, like we all do ,honestly, like we all do. And my heart wanted me to know memories and concepts that were hurting me that were holding me back that were making me feel kind of lousy and as I was able over time to breathe to shift my focus toward the information coming from that pain in the heart, I was able to help it. You know, you don't have to just walk around with a big heavy heart all the time, acting as if you know you have a chest full of butterfly right? We we often have a heavy heart and it's okay to look at it. It's okay to listen to it. It's okay to not talk at it for a minute. It was really funny when I'm working with people even when I'm working myself and the request will be to focus toward what you're feeling. Just focus on it and be with it for a minute and ask it, you know what's going on. And often within seconds, either my client or sometimes me are talking at this sensation, you know demanding that it step back or demanding that it change you're demanding that it tell us what's going on with you. And it just doesn't work that way. So the idea of listening with an inner voice or an inner ear to these inner voices is really confusing and I get it's really tricky at first. But it is how we are we are set up to be able to do it. I don't know if it comes from sort of just basic instinct that we've forgotten along the way. As our brains have become kind of the the you know, ruler of the body or what, but we really can listen into what our feelings are and especially those of our heart. I think the heart in particular is so full and rich of the neurons that communicate that if we just wait a minute, we're going to get impressions and sometimes images and sometimes words or sensations or memories and they come and you can't make this stuff up. I'll tell you right now, you cannot make it up. It surprises me every time and it surprises my clients every time. They'll go, oh my goodness, where did that come from there? It was if you've lived a life, you have stored info right, that's how we survive. What if we didn't store any information, can you imagine? Right? 

We really take for granted that we can store information that we need to live right? Like people with memory of disability. They can't do a lot of things right? They can't drive often because it wouldn't occur to them to hit the brake or to know what a stop sign was. Right. But we take for granted that we can do all of these things because we have memory in the brain that our brain holds this like a little you know roller decks little card. That is not an updated image. I recognize it's like a computer hard drive. How's that? Right? It's the memory bank but I really want us to remember that the body too holds memory, it holds insight, it holds images that we need for living. We need these for living. 

So take a moment even now even now as you hear my voice take a breath and send it towards your heart and actually as I do that right now my heart calms. It really feels rested and like ah you said what you wanted to say I get you. But take a minute with some curiosity and some compassion and just notice your heart, you know that beating thing in your chest and all the surrounding sensations maybe up high into your throat, maybe down lower towards your diaphragm all of that. I think you're going to find it if you haven't done it lately it's kind of amazing. And maybe if you're committed to just doing it a little bit more. You know, maybe before you make a decision, or if you're feeling some kind of confusion in your mind, you take a minute and you recognize I've got another resource here, hang on. And you take a breath and you breathe into that beautiful beating heart space. Ha! And hopefully like me, you won't feel like you're having a heart attack and perhaps you should call 911 though. If you do and you are then do. But in my case, I was fine. I'm gonna hope that in your case you're fine too, have a wonderful week. I'll talk with you next time and in the meantime, notice that heart, be a little more seriously yourself in your heart space, right? And let me know how it goes for you. I really look forward to hearing from you. Thanks so much for being here. Talk to you soon. Bye bye. 

Thank you for joining me for this episode of Seriouslyourself. To help treat yourself well each week, go ahead and subscribe to Seriouslyourself wherever you listen to podcasts, and please share this link with anyone you love who might be seeking a little more truth and delight in their lives. If you just can't get enough and you'd like even more goodness, you can become a part of Seriouslyourself, The Membership Community. You'll receive a monthly magazine, personal gatherings and cool little treats delivered right to your mailbox. Find out more about that on my website: https://ingridyhelanderlmft.com/seriouslyourself-the-membership/. And thanks to those who make Seriouslyourself special: our wonderful music is Midsummer from the album Flood by the fabulous Joel Helander. Seriouslyourself is produced by Particulate Media, K.O. Myers, Executive Producer. The ideas and inspirations come from beautiful humans like you, that I feel lucky to know. And I'm Ingrid Helander. Take good care of yourself. See you next time.