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Tag Archives: Creative Expression

No. 78: The Power of a Pause

January 5, 2012 2:02 pm ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week to attain, maintain or regain my sense of well-being… Coping Kete…I will practice pausing as a first response to intense emotion. While this may not seem like it will change much, it is a vital step in my journey to being able to change the way I respond to my feelings. Each time I notice a shift in my emotion, I will pause myself by using self-talk to describe to myself what I am feeling in this moment. For example, when I notice I am feeling stressed out, I will pause and say to myself “I am feeling stressed out right now. It’ s time to pause.” I will take a couple of deep breaths and then carry on as I see fit. This week I am creating moments for myself between feeling and reacting. I can react however I wish, this week the focus is on creating the pause and giving myself encouragement to keep doing so. Each time I pause myself, I will congratulate myself for being able to take the pause. Even if all I do is say ‘ pause time’ in my head. It is not easy to pause oneself in the course of such an automatic reaction as an emotional response and it is important to acknowledge the achievement each time. This way I will reinforce the practice of pausing before responding to the way I feel and turn it into a habit. Later, I will be able to follow this strategy with other techniques that allow me to change the way I am feeling after the pause. This week though, I am going to practice the pause, which is like a platform for launching other strategies from. If this is difficult to begin with, I will practice on mild emotional experiences or I will practice pausing during times when I am not particularly feeling anything at all. Taking a week or so to do this can help us build up. Once I am comfortable with pausing and describing the situation and how I feel about it to myself, I will add this to my Personal Coping Kete as a strategy for engaging with the current moment to deal with distress.
Posted in: Engagement ⋅ Tagged: , , ,

No. 70: Being Specific

November 10, 2011 10:45 am ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week to attain, maintain or regain my sense of wellbeing… Coping KeteI will practice keeping my self-talk specific to help moderate my responses to things. Often I find my internal dialogue includes words like ‘ always’ , ‘ everything’ and ‘ never’ that generalise what I am experiencing in the moment out to all situations. This amplifies the emotions I experience as a result and makes things seem more significant than they really are. This week, I will practice observing my self-talk during the day and using the most specific language I can find. So when I catch myself thinking things like ‘ I always screw things up’ or ‘ they never notice me’ , I will turn it around in my head to be more like ‘ I made a mistake just then’ or ‘ they didn’ t notice me just then’ . Rather than then allow myself to go down the path of remembering other times this has happened or might happen, I will focus my mind onto other specific things about this current situation. This might involve simply listing to myself the specific elements in play in the moment – from the temperature, to the environment, to the people around me, to my own reactions to these things – or it might involve listing the ways in which this situation is different from past similar situations. As my mind wanders onto other thoughts, I will remind myself that I can only know what is here now and bring my mind back to the task of observing and describing my current situation to myself. Here I am in this moment, which I can only ever experience once. Once I am comfortable with noticing my self-talk and using specific language, I will add this to my Personal Coping Kete as a strategy for soothing distressing or intense emotions.
Posted in: Mindful Distraction, Self-Soothing ⋅ Tagged: , , , , ,

No. 69: Growth instead of Achievement

November 3, 2011 7:58 pm ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week, to attain, maintain or regain my sense of wellness… Coping Keterather than placing pressure on myself to ‘ succeed’ or ‘ achieve’ , I am going to practice being aware of how I am growing. As I move through my day, I will come back to the thought that “I am a work in progress, constantly learning how to handle life.” This week I will remember that anything that goes seemingly ‘ wrong’ , will teach me how to deal with it better next time, so it actually has value for me and will make me stronger. Once I am comfortable thinking of the ways I am growing in everyday situations, I will add this to my Personal Coping Kete as a way of soothing unwanted or distressing emotions. By reminding myself of things like this in times of stress, I can work to make sure the expectations I am placing upon myself are realistic.
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No. 67: Removing the Pressure

October 20, 2011 8:16 pm ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week, to attain, maintain or regain my sense of wellbeing… Coping Kete…when I encounter everyday problems and hiccups, I will make things seem more manageable by reminding myself ‘ all I need to do is get through this one moment.’ Instead of piling pressure on myself to measure up to expectations, I will tell myself that I don’ t need to do anything but get through each moment and anything else is an added bonus, so I can relax and go with it. I’ ll then take myself through the standard breathing exercise while I give myself a brief running commentary of the moment I am currently in. Once I have described the moment to myself I will come back to my original idea that I just need to get through this moment and that means all I need to do is keep breathing. Once I am comfortable removing the pressure and doing some breathing in everyday situations, I will add it to my Personal Coping Kete for times of stress and distress.
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No. 65: Soothing the Personal Sting

October 6, 2011 4:46 pm ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week, to attain, maintain or regain my sense of wellbeing… Coping KeteI will practice taking the sting out of interpersonal situations by viewing other people’ s actions and reactions as being about them and not me. It is a natural human response to consider how we are received by those around us. Often though, we can personalise things that really have nothing to do with us. For example if someone frowns while we are speaking, we might assume they are displeased with us. But they could be concentrating or have a personal relationship to something we said. This week I will give people space to be responding to their own set of wants, needs, attitudes and challenges. Thinking about alternative, less personal ways of interpreting things can really help to reduce our sense of distress or hurt. So this week when I notice shifts in mood, I am going to scan my thoughts and see whether I have been taking something personally. Whenever I catch myself taking something on board as being about me, I will make a quick list of other things that could be responsible as well. It can often help to jot these things down in a notepad or on a scrap of paper – when we are really distressed it can otherwise be quite hard to concentrate on alternative explanations. This exercise could help with dealing with past situations that continue to distress me as memories as well. Once I have become comfortable identifying personalised thoughts and taking out the personal sting in everyday situations, I will add it to my Personal Coping Kete as a way of thinking myself through stress and distress.
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No. 63: Taking Comfort in the Inevitability of Change

September 22, 2011 8:58 pm ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week to attain, maintain or regain my sense of wellbeing… "" …I will practice taking a couple of deep breaths and keeping a sense of perspective by reminding myself about the inevitability of change and how the current moment will shift. It might take a minute, an hour, a day or even weeks or months, but things will be different. Nothing ever stays the same. I will tell myself this in the moment and I will think about how I would like it to be different and what could be done to move myself closer to that picture of things. If it is hard to focus on this without counteracting it with negative automatic thoughts, I will try writing it down. I will then turn my attention to something else in my environment to involve my attention in something else. I am practicing allowing myself to let go of each moment and get a different experience. Once I am familiar with taking comfort in the possibility of change and redirecting my attention in everyday situations, I will add it to my Personal Coping Kete as a way of coping with stressful and distressing moments.
Posted in: Self-Soothing ⋅ Tagged: , , ,

No. 62: Easing the burden

September 15, 2011 11:08 pm ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week, to attain, maintain or regain my sense of wellbeing… ""I will remember the words of Ingrid Bacci, ‎”Inner growth is a slow and incremental process that accomplishes extraordinary results through what often look like minute daily changes” As I move through my daily life, this week, I will recall this quote and remind myself that all that is required are “minute changes” – and minute changes or minute actions are usually pretty manageable. I will observe how thinking about things in this way affects me. There’ s real wisdom in the old saying that the longest journey, begins with the smallest step. I will take comfort in my smallest steps. In each moment of distress, I will ask myself, what’ s the smallest step I could take to shift my experience right now? What’ s smaller than that? When I’ ve got to the minutest change, I’ ll think about giving that a go. The act of thinking through this exercise is a minute change in itself, whether it leads to anything else or not. When I manage to do it, I will be sure to acknowledge the achievement to myself. Once I am used to lowering my expectations for myself in everyday situations, I will add it to my Personal Coping Kete for times of heightened stress of distress. When I feel impatient or frustrated with myself about something or feel overwhelmed by a situation, I will remember that growth and survival comes from minute actions. I will think of minute actions I can take in the moment and remember how they have affected me recently.
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No. 59: Building a Positive Memory Bank

August 25, 2011 4:52 pm ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week to attain, maintain or regain my sense of wellbeing… Coping Kete… I will use self-talk to congratulate and praise myself for each small positive thing that happens or each thing that I do well. That means that this week I will notice the little moments of strength, skill, safety and resilience. I will consciously acknowledge these moments to myself, by describing them in my head and giving myself some kind of ‘ well done’ or ‘ good one’ and actually let myself feel good about it. I will make sure that I smile each time. Once I am used to acknowledging my strengths and successes in everyday moments, I will add it to my Personal Coping Kete as a way of soothing negative automatic thoughts during times of stress and distress. Whenever I notice myself feeling stressed, pressed or distressed, I will recall these moments of self-praise to give myself some supportive evidence that I can get through this moment and work to notice the good things I am doing in this moment right now. I will bring myself back to the concept that ‘ this too shall pass‘ by building memories of myself getting through and recalling them when I need to. This starts by building my awareness of the small moments when things go well, rather than only counting the big events as meaningful.
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No. 58: Coming Back to Centre

August 18, 2011 8:26 pm ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week to attain, maintain or regain my sense of wellbeing… Coping KeteI will be mindful of the calm, light centre I take within me everywhere I go. No matter what life layers on top of me, that centre is unchangeable. I will be aware that though my moods and thoughts and situation change, I can always return to this light place within. It is there, even when I can’ t see or feel it. Even if I am feeling really low or dark, the light place within me remains. I can touch it whenever I want to. When I notice slight shifts in my mood and frame of mind, I will remind myself that I carry this place within me. In my mind’ s eye I will visualise this calm centre inside me and I will see myself moving towards it, while I practice the standard breathing exercise. In this way, I will practice reminding myself of my own intrinsic, unchangeable worth and capacity to experience something different in a range of different situations. Once I am comfortable noticing slight shifts in my mood and coming back to centre, I will add it to my Personal Coping Kete as a way of self-soothing in the midst of distressing situations.
Posted in: Self-Soothing ⋅ Tagged: , , , ,

No. 56: The Kind-Hearted Self-Therapist

August 4, 2011 3:14 pm ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week, to attain, maintain or regain my sense of wellbeing… Coping KeteI will practice using a self-interview technique to give myself support and get clear on what is happening for me each day. The self-interview technique involves inventing my own ideal supporter or self-therapist and then taking on the role myself by asking myself a series of gentle questions and answering them. I can do this in my head or on a piece of paper. A lot of people find it easier on paper to begin with. In preparation for practicing the technique, I will write a short list of questions down on a small piece of paper that I can easily keep handy to jog my memory. This is important because I will probably find it hard to think of useful questions to ask myself when I am in the middle of feeling stressed or distressed. Also in preparation, I will invent a whole character around this self-therapist based on the ideal form of support I would like to receive when I am distressed – then when I do the activity, it might be easier to practice talking to myself in this loving, compassionate way, especially if it is something I don’ t do very often. I will then practice using my kind-hearted self-interview about my daily experience every day. Once I am comfortable interviewing myself about my daily experiences in a compassionate way like this, I will add it to my Personal Coping Kete as a way of dealing with stress and distress. When I notice that I am feeling stressed or distressed, I will pause and use the self-interview to give myself a moment to become aware of what is driving my response and what could balance it out in a supportive, compassionate way. Some good questions to ask myself might be:\r

    \r

  1. What is in my mixed-bag of feelings right now?

    2. \r

  2. What thoughts have been running through my head?

    3. \r

  3. What is happening around me right now?

    4. \r

  4. What are the other possible interpretations of these events?

    5. \r

  5. What evidence do I have for these alternative interpretations?

    6. \r

  6. What interpretations take all of the evidence into account?

    7. \r

\r This exercise will allow me to practice stepping out of the moment to access a more objective state of mind that fits with my way of seeing things. When human beings are distressed our attention naturally narrows down to focus only on the things that are distressing so we can react to them – this exercise will allow me to return to a more expansive viewpoint that is able to take in all of the elements of the situation around me before I react. Often this will change the way I feel about the situation and bring the intensity of my responses down. It takes time to get familiar with techniques like this one – if we are used to being our biggest self-critic, we might find ourselves engaging in self-judgement at various times, which can sometimes make these thought-based activities distressing. I will pay special attention to giving myself encouraging self-talk and compassion during the activity, respecting the way I react to and cope with things. In this way, I will take the role of kind-hearted, self-therapist. I could give myself my ideal form of support, regardless of what kinds of support I am actually being given from the people around me.

Posted in: Expression & Support, Self-Soothing ⋅ Tagged: , , ,