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Tag Archives: Social Connection

No. 88: Delaying My Response

March 16, 2012 11:19 am ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week, to attain, maintain or regain my sense of wellbeing… Coping Kete…when I find I have something to say to someone, rather than rushing to express myself straight away, I will remind myself that I might feel differently later. I will resolve to turn my attentions to something else and see how I feel about it later on or the next day. I will then move onto completing my tasks for the day. When I return to think about the situation and assess how I feel, I will start off by thinking about what might have been happening for the other person at the time and how that might have influenced their behaviour. I will think about whether the way I thought about it at the time, still seems accurate or whether there might be another way of looking at things. I will think about whether I need to do or say anything now or at another time and what I could do or say, taking their perspective into account as well my own. Once I have become comfortable delaying everyday responses, I will add this strategy to my Personal Coping Kete as a way of dealing with distressing moments.
Posted in: Expression & Support, Mindful Distraction, Self-Soothing ⋅ Tagged: , , , , ,

No 87: Being My Own Loving Parent

March 8, 2012 10:03 pm ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week, to attain, maintain or regain my sense of wellbeing… Coping Kete…I will practicing being my own unconditionally loving parent. When I find myself falling into self-critic mode, I will say comforting things to myself. I will encourage myself on. I will have compassion for what I am going through. I will praise my strengths and remember my victories. I will attend to my self-care needs and make sure I am alright. I might imagine my ideal kind of loving parent in advance so that I am prepared with the kinds of things I might say to myself if I get distressed. This week, I take care of myself the way I want to be taken care of by others. Once I am comfortable saying caring and encouraging things to myself in everyday moments, I will add this strategy to my Personal Coping Kete as a way of soothing distress. When I encounter stress or distress I will think about how I would want my ideal loving parent to respond to me and I will respond to myself that way.
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No. 85: Looking for Encouragement

February 24, 2012 8:46 pm ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week, to attain, maintain or regain my sense of wellbeing… Coping Kete…I will help myself get through my problems by letting someone know what I am feeling and seeking encouragement. I will use whatever means is appropriate to me in the moment, whether I need to take a private moment to make a phone call to someone I trust or talk to someone I am with. For example, if I am worried about something that is happening in a meeting or social situation, I might need to excuse myself to give a friend a call or ask to talk to someone I trust there privately or maybe I will be comfortable talking to whoever happens to be there. I’ ll let them know the situation I am in, what I am worried about/how I am affected and what I need encouragement with. And then I will let them encourage me. If it is a personal matter and I am talking to someone who finds giving encouragement difficult or uncomfortable, I might try something like asking them to help me remember what strengths I have to help me get through. It might sound cheesy when it’ s put in those terms, but I can say it any way I want. This week, I actively look for encouragement when I need it. Sometimes it is hard to believe in ourselves when the going gets tough – at these times, we can look to the people around us for reminders. Then, later, I can refer to the memories of their encouragement to get me through when they are not around. It is okay to feel what I feel and to look for support when I need it. This week, I will not make myself stand alone. If I am out of practice with seeking encouragement and support, I will start out by seeking encouragement for small things that I find easy to talk about, during times of low stress. This will allow me to get used to it, before I am in a bad way and find it hard to do. Once I can seek out other people without a large amount of anxiety, I will add this to my Personal Coping Kete as a way of coping during times of distress.
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No. 81: Remembering Their Positives

January 26, 2012 8:07 pm ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week to attain, maintain or regain my sense of wellbeing… Coping Kete…I will practice balancing my reactions to other people, however valid they may be, by listing to myself at least two good things that they have done or said in the past, before I respond to them. By making sure I acknowledge the positive intentions or past actions of people, I can help balance the way I feel about their less pleasant actions. Making myself aware of these balancing factors won’ t necessarily make my other thoughts go away – they could actually be realistic! But it will make sure that they exist as part of a more complete picture of the situation. Sometimes, the things we don’ t like, are a bit more bearable when we can see the good that exists around them. This week, when I notice negative reactions to the people around me, I will practice thinking of two positive things to balance it. It can sometimes help to think of things by sitting down with a pen and paper. The positives don’ t have to be significant things to ‘ count’ either, it could be something like ‘ they always offer me a cup of coffee when they’ re making one.’ This week, I am practicing taking account of all of the information to get a balanced view of the people around me and be better prepared to respond well. Once I am familiar with reminding myself of people’ s positives, I will add this to my Personal Coping Kete as a self-soothing and distraction strategy for times when I find myself irritated, annoyed or upset with something a friend, colleague or family member has done or said. If it turns out that, after trying this for a while, I notice the positive things really do not seem to balance the negative things about being around a person, I will seek support to figure out what I can do about it and turn to a different kind of coping strategy that will help me get through my feelings of hurt.
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No. 73: Using Opposites

December 1, 2011 1:51 pm ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅
This week, to attain, maintain or regain my sense of wellbeing… Coping Kete…I will practice coping by looking at the situation from the opposite viewpoint. Reversing my perspective in this way can take me down different and new trains of thought that could lead me to feel differently about things. When I notice slight shifts in my mood, I will pause myself to reflect on what I am thinking in the moment. Then I will ask myself “What if the opposite were true?” For example, if I notice I start feeling slightly hopeless or pessimistic, I will try to look at the situation from the opposite hopeful perspective. Instead of thinking “this is hopeless” I will ask myself “what if it was actually hopeful?“ How would I see the situation then? This week is about challenging the assumptions that underlie my thoughts and feelings. This week I open up to the possibility of other ways of experiencing my reality. Once I am comfortable doing this with slight shifts in mood, I will add this to my Personal Coping Kete as a way of coping with distress.
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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.
Posted in: Engagement, Self-Soothing ⋅ Tagged: , , ,

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.
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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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