Inspirations

 

 

Have you taken a mindful pause to reflect on 2021?  What moments stand out for you?
What lessons have you learned?

 

  As we are amid the holiday season, surrounded by festivities, radiant decorations, and a contagious holiday spirit, we may also be faced with or feel pressured to engage in a slew of “shoulds.” For example, I should feel joyous and merry; my family and friends should celebrate alongside me; I should receive the gift I want. Additionally, we may have a strong desire to avoid disagreements with family members, loneliness stemming from comparing our situation with that of others, and anxiety about what the New Year may bring. These challenges make sense, particularly when cultural and social mores and traditions may dictate how our reality “should” be.

            Non-attachment is a concept defined as the ability to unstick from desires; let go of thoughts, opinions, and expectations of how things “should” be; and refrain from clinging onto our likes and preferences as well as avoiding or discarding the things to which we feel aversive. Alternatively, attachment can exacerbate our suffering, especially when we notice a discrepancy between our desires and reality. Rather than thinking about non-attachment as renunciation or dissociation, non-attachment is about finding the middle path between extremes and discovering freedom from the stronghold that our minds may have over us.

While I may experience disappointment because my friends are attending multiple parties, whereas I am not, can I encourage myself to unclench the tension in my body, relax my grasping on expectations, and change my relationship to my thoughts a little more? Surely, one option is to accumulate positive experiences and follow suit with additional party invitations. And, we can attempt to target and address the root, weed out our attachment to thoughts such as, ‘My self-worth depends on the number of parties I attend,’ and compassionately plant the seed of non-attachment. Perhaps, that may look like loosening up our expectations, challenging our cognitions and myths, and practicing dialectical thinking.

We hope that you may practice the gift of non-attachment.

 

 

Have you noticed the holiday themed lights, music, movies and commercials? They are everywhere! We are now in the midst of the holiday cheer. Have you considered why the holiday cheer can be positive? Why is creating holiday spirit helpful to us?

The magic of the holidays can feel exciting, especially when looking forward to special events and traditions. The holiday season brings bright lights, cheerful music, snowy days, and usually an influx of sweets and treats. Being around family and friends during this season can be great for boosting your mood. Sharing in traditional activities or experiencing new ones provides an opportunity to be mindful of positive emotion and behavior.

In DBT we use a skill called accumulating positives to create these types of pleasant events, which do not need to be complicated. For example, plan a night to cook or bake a festive dish that you enjoy. Play holiday music in your home. To further elicit positive emotions, decorate a room with lights, photos, and aromatic candles. This skill teaches us how to regulate our emotions by engaging in things that bring us joy. The goal is to generate positive emotions to experience consistent amusement, inspiration, interest and even hope!

We would love to hear how you get in “the spirit” during this time of year.

 
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With Thanksgiving behind us, it is fair to say we are in The Holiday Season. This unique time of year regularly turns our attention toward noticing abundance, contributing to others, practicing gratitude, and participating fully at various celebrations. In addition, we are compelled through seasonal songs, greeting cards, and traditions to feel joy, peace, and love. While the messaging behind the holiday season is well-intended, some of us find ourselves feeling quite willful in the face of “holiday cheer”. The “shoulds” hidden behind each wrapped gift, dinner gathering, and cookie-baking session will serve as a reminder to some of us of how sad, empty, lonely, angry and confused we are.

No one looks forward to being told what to feel and when to feel it. Until a difficult emotion has been named, validated, and soothed, many of us are unable or unwilling to open our minds up to a more positive emotional experience. This can be especially true about feelings of grief, sadness, and loss. The more our holiday-focused environment floods us with demands for enthusiasm, the more “wrong” we are likely to feel in our emotional low. How does this BioSocial transaction impact your behavior? What does it look like to other people, and how do they respond to you?

DBT asks that we regularly practice Mindfulness to increase our awareness of our own internal experience as a means towards letting go of suffering. What can you learn from being mindful to feelings of loss, sadness, or grief that may start to crop up? Can you start to make meaning out of those observations and use them as brick and mortar for your life worth living?

The holiday season is upon us.  This time of year can bring warmth, joy and happiness on the one hand, and stress, anxiety and disappointment on the other.  It is challenging when this time is described as the “most wonderful time of the year.”  That’s a whole lot of expectation for a short period of time!  During this holiday season, we are interested in inviting you to invest in coping ahead for reality.  When we get armed with understanding our difficulties, we are able to form a plan, organize, feel more prepared, and less startled.
 
This week, we would like to offer an opportunity for you to treat your DBT skills as a gift to yourself.  The process of gift giving to others is not so different from gifting ourselves with a personalized cope ahead plan.  When we give a gift to someone else, we start by brainstorming ideas based on our knowledge of the individual.  Similarly, in creating our very own cope ahead plan, we want to begin by naming potential triggers that prompt emotions and actions likely to interfere with using our skills.  Next up, we have to decide what skills we plan on implementing to reduce our emotional vulnerabilities and cope with the prompting situation.  When we give to others, we are mindful of their needs.  Parallel to this process, when thinking of ourselves, we want to stay mindful of the skills that are useful to reducing our suffering.
 
What mindfulness tools will help you stay present in the current moment?  What ways can you incorporate self soothing and distracting into your holiday time?  Can you commit to prioritizing your PLEASE skills?  Once you have identified the skills that are going to be essential for your cope ahead plan, we invite you to imagine yourself during the holiday season utilizing the skills in the given situation.  Picture yourself turning your mind away from old patterns of behavior and towards utilizing your identified cope ahead plan. Give yourself the gift of a skillful holiday season!

I recently came across a new book, “Hooked” by Sutton Foster, and was intrigued. In it a Broadway star, actress and singer, speaks about how crafting helped her throughout her own battle with mental illness in both herself and her family. The book struck a chord with me. Crafting, for me specifically knitting, is what makes me feel happy and relaxed. As my family will attest to, I typically have a knitting project that is around, ready to be picked up and worked on. Currently my favorite type of knitting project is simple and repetitive. The same stitches and movements again and again, like a rhythm. Knitting is my mindfulness practice. I tend to knit a few rows before I go to sleep it serves as my own way to wind down and decompress.

When I reflect on it, I recognize how knitting, my craft, has helped me through tougher times. After being introduced briefly as a child, I picked up knitting again during graduate school. It helped me focus one something other than papers and grades, and the next hurtle that I had to go through. I knitted during Grand Rounds during my post doc, even teaching one of my colleagues to knit as well. Knitting was a way that I could carve out some time for myself doing something I enjoyed. The simple act of taking out the yarn and holding it in my hands is a cue for me to take a breath and relax.

For many of us, Mindfulness is a challenging DBT skill. I personally find that I benefit most often from a mindfulness practice that is more active and engaging. Something that captures my mind and forces me to be present. Knitting is an easy way for me to engage mindfully.

The DBT skill of Building Mastery is also part of this process for me. At the end of every knitting adventure I have something that I have created, made with my own two hands. Unlike many aspects of our lives, there is a completed project at the end. A gift to give a friend, or a hat to welcome a new baby. I love the act of presenting something I made to someone I love.

One of the tougher moments in my life was when I suffered from a miscarriage and lost a baby. Knitting helped me through that grief. I remember picking up some yarn and starting a baby blanket. I hoped that I would be able to pass that blanket along to my second child. The mindful practice of knitting that blanket helped me grieve. My daughter, who is now 10, sleeps with that blanket on her bed every night.

Crafting presents us with an opportunity to be present, to be mindful, to create. No matter what type of craft you choose –drawing, writing, sewing, painting – it can be an opportunity to take a break and focus on something in the moment. This is powerful. As a mom, I hope to teach this to my own children.

As you continue your journey, I encourage you to think about what practice of active mindfulness will be, and if you would like to incorporate more crafting into your life.

Book: “Hooked” by Sutton Foster

If you are interested in learning to knit, check out how to knit videos on You Tube. I also love these two knitting sites that sell materials and have tutorials:

www.weareknitters.com
www.woolandthegang.com

The best way to get advice, however, is to go to your local yarn store and ask. Enjoy!