This mental health crisis is real and the stakes are higher than ever. By the age of 40, half of us resonate with a mental health diagnosis. Only 20% of those suffering from mental distress see any meaningful improvement with traditional biomedical treatment methods. 80% continue to suffer. It’s time to heed the evidence and shift beyond the outdated belief systems that keep us mired in ineffective mental health treatment methods. Dr. Crosbie Watler, a thought leader with decades of experience as a psychiatrist and mental health advocate, issues a call to action!

The Failed Promise of Modern Psychiatry

by Dr. Crosbie Watler, MD, FRCPC

The last decade of the twentieth century was a heady time for modern psychiatry.  Fluoxetine was released in the in the mid 80’s and many other so-called anti-depressants followed on its heels.  Though never proven, we touted the neurotransmitter deficit model for depression and truly believed that we were on the threshold of a major breakthrough in psychiatry and neuroscience.  In our collective excitement, we dubbed the 1990’s “The Decade of the Brain.” 

Fast forward to present day.  Despite widespread and often indiscriminate prescribing, on a per capita basis, there are far more persons off work on disability for anxiety and depressive related disorders than ever before.  The increase continues and is exponential.

There are two myths at play that serve to perpetuate the status quo.  First, is the myth of diagnosis in psychiatry.  In other areas of medicine, a diagnosis is a discrete, objectively verifiable condition.  There remain many symptom clusters that fail to meet this standard.  Lacking objective tests—much less treatments—the rest of medicine classifies these conditions as syndromes. 

Examples of common syndromes include Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and Irritable Bowel Syndrome.  In a desperate attempt to enhance the prestige of psychiatry—and as a requirement for billing the HMO’s in the US—the APA’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual incorporates more diagnoses with each edition.  The belief that psychiatric diagnoses are defined constructs, on par with other areas of medicine, is the myth at the core of modern psychiatric practice.  Simply calling something a disorder, does not make it real (Joel Paris).

The image of a group of endocrinologists debating whether Type 1 diabetes should be a legitimate diagnosis is laughable, yet this is precisely how psychiatric “diagnoses” are minted.  If something is objectively real, we don’t debate its existence, and what was truth does not simply become untruth with the next edition of DSM.  The DSM committee meetings provide forums for so-called experts to lobby for their pet “diagnoses”, ones they feel comfortable treating and ones that will enhance their credibility and prestige. 

Further, if these diagnoses were real and credible, then why do psychiatrists so commonly disagree among themselves?  It is common to hear reference made to a psychiatrist’s particular “style.”  One psychiatrist’s Borderline Personality Disorder is another’s Bipolar Type 2, with entirely different treatment protocols. 

Lacking consensus on diagnosis, it is no surprise that the trajectory of psychiatric patient care is highly variable, depending on the bias of the treating psychiatrist.  Highly variable production systems operate at the expense of quality.  And who bears the cost of a highly variable system of care?  Certainly not the treating physician.  Most physicians are paid for face time, not for outcome.  This is akin to a contractor coming to your home and being paid for simply showing up. 

If strike one—so to speak—is that our diagnoses are syndromes, then strike two is that our medical treatments lack efficacy.  Given that we truly have no idea what we are treating in the first place, this should not come as a surprise!   An embarrassing and rarely mentioned statistic, is that our so-called antidepressants barely separate from placebo.  Further, we’ve since learned that many negative studies were simply mothballed (Lancet, 2012). 

What is truly incredible is that these medicines are still being marketed as anti anything.  If our antidepressants and antipsychotics lived up to their lofty promise, most psychiatrists would be out of work and the “treatment resistant” patients clogging our inpatient and tertiary care units would be promptly discharged.  This, of course, is not the case.  

Unfortunately, the public continues to drink from the punch bowl still being served by mainstream psychiatry.  How many times have you heard a friend recounting a visit to the doctor?

“The doctor says I have a brain disease called Major Depressive Disorder.  There is not enough serotonin in my brain, apparently.  He started me on Cipralex.”

Two months later you ask how she’s doing.

“Oh that medication didn’t work very well, I’m still off work.  My doctor added a second medication, Wellbutrin to ‘boost’ the first one, plus I’m on something to help me sleep…insomnia is a side effect of Wellbutrin.”

Two months later your friend stops by for a visit.

“My doctor thinks the reason my medications aren’t working is that I might have Bipolar Disorder.  He says there’s a ‘soft’ type that’s increasingly diagnosed these days.  He added a mood stabilizer.  I’m on four meds now and still off work.  I’m starting to lose hope.”

The above is played out countless times, day in and day out.  As a boomer psychiatrist, trained in the era of “biological psychiatry,” I soon realized that we were not healing patients in any substantive way with our medications.  We are creating life-long mental health care consumers.

We prescribe mediocre treatments for phantom conditions.  We cling desperately to the cloak of expertise and knowingness.  We have become less interested in the complex personal stories that might explain a patient’s suffering and inform non-pharmaceutical approaches.  We are quick to identify “disorder”, when the patient’s challenge might be a natural and logical downstream manifestation of upstream and primary causes.  This, to be fair, is a criticism that applies to other areas of medicine.

The conventional medical paradigm is rooted in the principle of specificity—a specific treatment for each discrete disease.  In common parlance, a pill for every ill. We are in an era of increasingly specialized medicine, where the physician puts his or her organ of choice on a pedestal, often treating the downstream symptoms as the primary condition.  When this fails—as it commonly does—psychiatrists often resort to desperate and toxic poly-pharmacy. 

Such prescribing is often the result of therapeutic despair on the part of the treating physician.  When a patient does not respond to treatment—and with physician’s ego on the chopping block—the doctor is desperate to do something, anything.  It seems that uninformed action is deemed somehow better than inaction. 

This demonstrates an all too familiar behavioural pattern and one not unique to the trades: when the only tool one has is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.  The hammer in this case is the prescription pad.  After many failed medication trials, the treating psychiatrist concludes that the problem lies with the patient, who is deemed treatment resistant.  The blame for treatment failure is projected onto the patient—they are treatment resistant. 

What of the possibility that we are simply using the wrong treatments?  Am we missing something?  Rarely are these questions at the table.  Curiosity and humility are simply thrown under the bus.  Above all, do no harm?  Also under the bus.  Despite all the claims for evidence-based and patient-centred care, the unavoidable and tragic conclusion is that the status quo works very well for the industry of care.  For the patients?  Not so much.

Much of what we do in clinical practice is simply “chasing smoke.”  We view the downstream symptoms as the primary condition.  Any first year medical student understands that fever is not a disease or disorder, it is a sign that there is something else amiss, something quite remote from the fever itself.  In medicine—and particularly in psychiatry—we often chase smoke. 

The majority of those labeled as depressed, are in fact distressed by the events in their lives and the stories they tell themselves about who they are.  Predictably, they fail to respond to our pharmacopeia.  Lost in the rush to increasingly specialized medicine, is the appreciation for the human organism as a whole.   We are the sum of our complex and interfacing systems, where symptoms in any one area might be secondary to remote upstream mediators.   The overarching clinical question then becomes, “Is this symptom the chicken or the egg?”

In our search for a better paradigm we might look to the wisdom of our ancient ancestors, from the Greeks, traditional Chinese, and yogi masters from thousands of years ago in India.  These teachings share the view that there is far more to us than meets the eye.  Am I my thoughts?  Is it as simple as, “I think, therefore I am?”  Who am I, really?  This question reflects our timeless quest for connection, identity, meaning and purpose. 

Connection with ourselves and with the world around us forms the bedrock of spritual health.  This new spirituality transcends specific religious affiliation and has spawned the phrase “spiritual but not religious.”  A holistic paradigm recognizes the importance of connectedness and is central to the Constitution of the WHO, wherein: “Health is a state of complete, physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.”  Social well-being flows from a sense that we are connected with ourselves and with the world around us. 

The truth is, we were never evolved to live as we are.  We evolved to live in clans, with myriad connections to others, with each member having a purpose that supported the whole.  The price we’ve paid for the modern lifestyle, with all its conveniences and trappings of success, is profound disconnection.  There is a pandemic of distress and existential despair.  The boomers have chased happiness for decades.  Yet here we are.  Bigger cars, monster homes, extravagant vacations, on line shopping, cosmetic surgery… something, anything to make us happy. 

When our happiness remains elusive, we go to our doctor.  We are then given a simple checklist that confirms we are depressed.  Never mind that we really have no idea what depression is and its interface with normalcy.  Recognizing this dilemma, the ancient Greeks created a boundary between angst and melancholia.  Angst was a response to some life challenge and was inherent to normal human experience.  Melancholia was a distinct, profound and continuous depressive state that seemed independent of life circumstance. 

Until the 1980’s, a patient’s depressive complaints were classified as being either reactive or endogenous.  This parallels the ancient boundary between angst and melancholia.  Reactive depressive symptoms were much less likely to respond to medication and were referred for psychotherapy.  This important distinction was dropped from DSM 3 (1980).  We are entering the fifth decade of an ever-expanded and over-inclusive concept of mental disorders.  That this coincides with the introduction and aggressive marketing of novel “anti” depressants, is no coincidence.  We are in an era of medicalising distress, where most patients prescribed medications will fail to benefit (BMJ, 2013).  They will instead, exhaust themselves going down rabbit holes that are proven and guaranteed to fail.

Elements of a holistic model

We tend to see only what we are trained to see or are comfortable managing.  The decade of the brain has got us no closer to curing mental illness.  Over the past decade there has been a dramatic decrease in the release of new psychotropic medications.  It seems that even the pharmaceutical industry is throwing in the towel.  Tweaking brain receptors, split off from the organism as a whole, is simply barking up the wrong tree.  There is a better way. 

The body:

The benefit of movement and exercise for our mental and physical well-being is widely recognized.  We’re all familiar with the saying, “healthy body—healthy mind.”  A truly healthy body goes beyond the facade of one’s appearance or BMI.  Vital health is from the inside out. Central to this, is the mind-gut connection.  While the serotonin produced in the gut does not cross the blood-brain barrier, inflammatory cytokines certainly do, where they severely compromise serotonin turnover.  What triggers this inflammatory process?  We need look no further than the modern first-World lifestyle.  The standard American diet (SAD diet) is inflammatory.  The stress response is inflammatory. 

Food as medicine is not a new concept.  Hippocrates, considered by many to be the father of modern medicine, implored his patients: “Let food be thy medicine and medicine thy food.”  Beyond passing familiarity with our national food guides, which are obsolete even as revised versions are published, today’s doctors get little or no training in nutritional health.

How many psychiatrists do a food diary with their patients?  How many are aware that inflammation might be a significant perpetuating factor for a patient’s depressive symptoms, much less test for it?   How many are able to prescribe a specific nutrition plan that would support recovery and vital health?  Beyond being passive recipients of care, how many psychiatrists call on their patients to be active partners in their holistic recovery plan? My patients are consistently amazed that a psychiatrist is asking them what they eat and at being sent on their way with a lab requisition and a nutrition remediation plan.

The mind

If our brains can be compromised by processes external to the blood-brain barrier, is the reverse also true?  How do our thoughts and emotions impact our bodies?  Living in the first world, we are often in a state of heightened sympathetic tone—a state of fight, flight, or freeze.  This adaptation is deeply wired into our brains and served us well for most of our evolutionary history, where imminent threats to life or limb were not uncommon.  The threat would present itself, but once the threat was over—and if we survived—our nervous system would return to the restful state required for the body to heal and repair.

Fast forward to present day.  The threat is no longer the discrete and tangible tiger or rival tribesman.  Today’s threat comes from having the luxury to sit and think, or more accurately ruminate, about all the potential calamities that might come our way.  There is no such thing as stress, there is only the stress response to an external challenge.  Life is challenging, it does not have to be stressful—stress is a possibility. 

Stress is a reflexive protective response at the level of our limbic brain—more specifically, the amygdala.  In the absence of an objective threat to life or limb, the stress response is commonly triggered by the stories we tell ourselves—the so-called amygdala hijack (Goleman,1996).  While we might not completely eliminate the amygdala hijack, we can certainly influence what happens next.  Rather than simply being along for the ride, we can learn to pause, witness and reflect:  Am I using my brain, or is my brain using me (Tanzi & Chopra)?   We can redirect from thoughts that are not serving us, recognizing that there is no such thing as stress in the external world, there is only the stress we create in response to life’s daily challenges.

The stress response depletes the body in so many ways.  As is the case with the SAD diet, stress is inflammatory.  Chronic inflammation is an essential component of chronic diseases (Liu et al, 2017).   Beyond its potential negative impact on mood, high levels of inflammation are commonly seen with PTSD, along with a host of medical conditions including coronary heart disease, diabetes, cancer and dementia.  Stress compromises our immune response and in combination with our nutrient poor SAD diets, heightens our susceptibility to disease.   Even when not afflicted by a diagnosable illness, we feel depleted, lacking vital health. 

A common presenting complaint is the patient claiming to have anxiety, or beyond that, an anxiety disorder.  Generalized Anxiety Disorder is the diagnosis commonly applied.  Rather than invoking yet another disorder, we might explore whether the anxiety response is a natural and logical consequence of dwelling on contexts beyond our immediate control.  We don’t classify tennis elbow as a disease.  Tennis elbow is an overuse injury.  Anxiety could be reframed as an overuse injury—overuse of the mind.

If I have my hand on a hot element, I can take Tylenol for the pain, or I can take my hand off the element.  If I have anxiety, I can take Lorazepam, or I can learn Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction.  I can learn to meditate.  I can evolve, giving up patterns that no longer serve me.  I can take my power back, redirecting from worrying about outcomes I cannot directly control.  I can learn to quiet the mind, to think only when it serves me.  I can experience the healing that comes from alert thoughtlessness (Eckhart Tolle). 

The spirit:

Spirit—herein defined as connection—is identifying with something beyond the material world, the world of form of form (Deepak Chopra).  This connection has two poles—connection within (the intrapersonal) and without (the interpersonal).  We tend to be distracted by the noise around us, the external relationships.  We feel hurt or rebuffed when we perceive some narcissistic injury.  Brooding about about how others treat us, we fail to recognize that we are our own harshest critics.  We’ve incorporated so many messages, subtle and explicit.  We can’t even remember where the story came from, yet we keep telling it:

“I am not enough.”

“I am a failure.”

“If others really knew me, they wouldn’t like me.”

“I feel so guilty for my mistakes.”

“I hate myself.”

How is healing possible in such a toxic intrapersonal space?  It is not.  Without self-compassion, nothing else can take hold and flourish.  Not CBT, not the next antidepressant trial, not even the whole foods organic diet.  After almost three decades of psychiatric practice, I continue to be amazed by the prevalence of self-loathing.  In clinical practice, this is often the elephant in the room, akin to “Don’t ask, don’t tell.”  The patient is certainly not going to volunteer, “By the way doctor, I think you ought to know that I really hate myself.”  Conversely, the psychiatrist is unlikely to ask, “How do you feel about yourself.”  Lacking their own self-awareness, the psychiatrist would be very uncomfortable knowing how to respond in any helpful way to a patient’s intrapersonal despair.  

Fundamentally, most of us have no idea who we are.  How can we have compassion for something we don’t know?  Self-awareness is the foundation for self-compassion.  Our sense of self is highly conditioned.  We identify with our roles, relationships, successes and failures.  “I am a psychiatrist.”  No, I am not that.  Psychiatrist is a temporary role I play in the movie of My Life.  Who am I when I am not in that role?  Whatever handle we identify with, does it capture the essence of who we are, or is it something that can change?  If “I am a success,” then who am I when I fail? 

We have become so identified with the doing, that we’ve lost awareness of the being that is at our essence.  On the day of our birth we cannot avoid awareness of being.  There is no inner dialogue or story telling us who we are, or where we might me going.   Undistracted by the thought stream, we are immersed in the silent witnessing that is our essential nature.  This silent witnessing is central to the practice of meditation.  From the stillness of no mind, we are content and whole. We are freed from the insatiable quest for something to make us happy. 

Putting it all together

Radical change requires radical action.  Radical action is far-reaching and thorough—no stone is left unturned.  Our treatments fail not because our patients are treatment resistant.  Our treatments fail because they are not sufficiently radical.  We are a complex interface of biological, psychological, social, and spiritual components.  A radical intervention dictates treating all the components of health assertively and simultaneously.  In this context, a model reliant on simple symptom checklists as evidence for any primary disorder, is doomed to fail.  How could it be otherwise?

Dr. Crosbie Watler completed his MA at Lakehead University and worked in Atikokan and the Challenge Club in Kenora before going to Medical School at McMaster in 1988. He then proceeded to do his residency in psychiatry at Dalhousie University. Upon completion he then returned to Kenora from 1995 – 2001 and worked at Lake of the Woods District Hospital as Chief of Psychiatry. In 2001 Dr. Walter relocated to Duncan BC with his wife and their three children where he acted as the Medical Director for Island’s Health MHSU and the Dept. Head for Psychiatry. His medical practice required clinical expertise in multiple settings including, tertiary, inpatient, outpatient and ACT. Dr. Watler’s current interests focuses on incorporating the best of modern medicine with holistic/integrative health. Dr. Watler is an executive member of the Roots Program, forging new pathways to alleviate suffering related to mental distress.

Somatic intelligence refers to our degree of awareness and ability to interpret and respond to the sensations of the body (De Silva, 2017).  There are over 100 different bodily sensations, which are categorized as emotions, cognitive processes, or somatic and homeostatic states (Nummenmaa, Hari, Hietanen, & Glerean, 2018).  A core factor that differentiates humans from animals is an expanded consciousness, providing an awareness of the body, separate from the spirit that inhabits it.  Awareness of these sensations, coupled with the desire and confidence to respond, correlates with our somatic intelligence.

Nummenmaa et al. (2018) researched over 1000 participants to map out where the typical sensations are felt in the body. The illustration below is an excellent way to gain awareness and an ability to interpret and respond to the varying bodily signals.

When the spirit and body are securely attached (as described in the previous blog post),  we become inherently conscious and motivated to listen and tend to the sensations, desires, and concerns of the body.  This secure attachment is imperative to feel into our bodily sensations and navigate the stress response.  If we are not securely attached, and our ability to be aware of or respond to the body is hampered, we will continue to experience stress until we tend to the body’s concern.

Somatic intelligence refers to our degree of awareness and ability to interpret and respond to the sensations of the body (De Silva, 2017).  When the spirit and body are securely attached,  we Somatic intelligence refers to our degree of awareness and ability to interpret and respond to the sensations of the body (De Silva, 2017).  There are over 100 different bodily sensations, which are categorized as emotions, cognitive processes, or somatic and homeostatic states (Nummenmaa, Hari, Hietanen, & Glerean, 2018).  A core factor that differentiates humans from animals is an expanded consciousness, providing an awareness of the body, separate from the spirit that inhabits it.

When the spirit and body are securely attached,  we become inherently conscious and motivated to listen and tend to the desires and concerns of the body.  This secure attachment between the body and the spirit is imperative to navigate the stress response.  If we are not securely attached, and our ability to be aware of or respond to the body is hampered, we will continue to experience stress until we tend to the bodily concern.

To manage stress and the ripple effects it has on the body, we must first attain a degree of non-attachment. Non-attachment happens when we step back from the uncomfortable and often threatening sensations of the body, dis-identifying with them, so we can tend to them from a more objective and compassionate place. To do this, it is immensely helpful to develop the habit of talking to the body with unconditional positive regard, much like we would a dear friend. 

For the body to securely attach to the spirit it must believe it is unconditionally positively regarded. The ONLY way to come to believe it is regarded in this way is to test the relational container by being honest, showing up and speaking up authentically. When we do this with others and people respond by treating us as though we are inherently worthy, even if they do not agree with the opinions and behaviours that emerge on the surface, we gain trust and security in the relationship.

Much like testing the containers of our relationships with others is essential to believing we are unconditionally positively regarded by them, when emotional messengers present, the body is testing the relational container of the spirit. If we avoid, ignore, and will them to go away or BE something different, we continue to erode trust between the spirit and body and the messages persist, resulting in chronic anxiety, depression, and all sorts of unwanted behavioural projections.  The most unfortunate consequence of ignoring these felt senses is that we continue to promote a fracture between the body and spirit.  Conversely, when we respond with unconditional positive regard, receiving the emotional message like we would a welcome guest, the sensations don’t feel personal or threatening. Rather, it’s like sitting across the table with a dear friend, making space for them to share what’s on their heart, and providing the compassionate space for them to BE, FEEL, and soothe whatever arises in that moment.

When talking to a dear friend, we are clearly separate from them, they are an ‘other,’ which enables us to step back (non-attach). From this orientation, we don’t over identify with them, which prevents their experience from feeling threatening to us. Now, imagine your body and felt senses within are this dear friend. While they are welcome guests, they are ‘others,’ not essential to the spirit of who you are. As allies, they bring important information, feeling into and reporting on the subtle energies, premonitions, and incongruences that swirl within and around us. 

Each time we listen to the body, tending to the sensations and emotions that cue us, we promote secure attachment between the spirit and the body, healing the fracture that lies beneath our suffering. When you stop, notice, lean in and tend to your sensations and feelings you are expanding your awareness and practicing self-compassion, building trust with the body. In time and with practice, the body comes to believe it is unconditionally positively regarded by the spirit. When the body deeply believes it, secure attachment happens. When securely attached, the body and spirit reach homeostasis, awakening us to a new way of BEing, providing the equanimity and resulting peace that enable us to thrive.

Pause to Practice: Talking to your Body
When the body sends you a message, experienced as sensations and emotions, stop. Take a moment to notice what is happening, just notice. Lean in to really get a sense of it.  You might even ask your body what it needs and wants or what it is afraid of. Name what you are feeling. How would you describe it?

Notice how it feels when you put a name to what you are feeling. Is it a good fit? Does it need some adjustments?  Getting curious like this helps you step back (non-attach), keeping you from over identifying with the feeling. From this more objective orientation, you can hold space for the feeling, just like you would hold space for a friend who is sharing something important with you. 

Remember, for us to sustain any new beneficial practice, the felt reward must overshadow the felt effort (at least in general). How might you incorporate this new orientation in your day to day life?

This same orientation can help when conflict with others is activating the stress response.  If we can’t step back, we are likely to react with a harmful projection (directed inwardly or outwardly).  Next time you are in conflict and are feeling lost inside the stress response, how might you discuss the needs and wants of your body (and associated emotions, sensations) in a way that promotes non-attachment and self-compassion?

Interested in learning more and investing in your ability to securely attach? We partnered with Ladysmith Family and Friends to provide (FREE) virtual circles that promote unconditional positive regard and resiliency. Register by emailing Kate at: LaFFkateW@shaw.ca

Like trees, our roots intertwine amid a forest of others, enabling an opportunity to collectively resource, taking what we need in times of need and giving what we can in times of plenty. This pandemic represents an opportunity for humans around the world to come together to navigate a common challenge, mitigating this global threat before it becomes a chronic stressor.

Each of us has varying degrees of personal resiliency, reflected in the depth of our ‘roots’ systems. As a result, transient ‘weather’ systems will feel more threatening (stressful) to some than others. The ‘weather’ is the events, thoughts, and emotions that circle us, taking many forms, individually and globally.

In these rapidly changing and often chaotic situations, a common form of ‘weather’ is ambiguity. When ambiguity is high, it causes many of us to spiral into fear states that fester amid a sea of potentially threatening scenarios. Adding to the ambiguity, collective actions taken to navigate the potential threat can cause additional insecurity, and especially for those whose primary needs (food, shelter) are at risk. As a result, stress levels are high, which can lead to either chronic anxiety (sympathetic nervous system stuck on) or freeze, leaving us feeling disconnected and depressed (parasympathetic nervous system stuck on). By grounding collectively, as opposed to isolating individually, we are more likely to manage these common human challenges before they evolve into chronic stressors.

So…what does this look like?

On a practical level, at the risk of overcomplicating a complex topic, there are three evidence-informed qualities we can cultivate to promote personal and collective resilience in these collectively uncertain times:

1. According to Polyvagal theory (Porges, 2011), we are more likely to regulate our stress and confidently manage challenges when we feel securely connected to others. For instance, in a pandemic scenario, while physical distance may be a requirement, social distancing is not. In this age of technology, we can stay connected to others, despite our physical limitations.
2. To bolster sense of coherence (Antonovsky, 1979), we can expand our awareness of the plethora of inner and outer resources at our disposal. We can ground ourselves by taking an inventory of the structures (family, work, hobbies), assets (a safe place to live, food, warmth), activities (exercise, breathing, hobbies that bring joy), and relationships (those you feel safe to be authentic with) that help you feel resourced and secure amid the felt chaos. When we feel out of control, lost in a sea of insecurity, reminding ourselves of our resources is imperative. It is our resources that help us interrupt the stress response and that boost our confidence so that we can creatively navigate challenges that arise before they turn into chronic stressors.
3. To keep us connected, preventing states of intense fight, flight, or freeze, we can use these uncomfortable emotions to cultivate habits that promote self-compassion (Rogers, 1959), or a greater ability to self-regulate and self-soothe when discomfort comes our way. We do this by showing up authentically, acknowledging and normalizing our suffering. When we pay attention to what is arising, we have an opportunity to provide the loving-kindness necessary to feel and tend to past and present wounds. This process begins with noticing when difficult thoughts and emotions arise, stepping back to recognize these stimuli as transient messengers, rather than overly identifying with them. With this stepping back (non-attachment), we are more able to provide loving-kindness to ourselves, much like we would a dear friend.

While urgencies and emergencies often feel threatening, they are excellent opportunities to brush off our resources, strengthen our sense of belonging in a larger community, and cultivate greater personal and collective resilience.

Perhaps it’s time we reclaim our spirituality

The body is a vessel of the spirit BEing, providing a spiritual container to actualize and connect, contributing to a grand and greater whole. When tuned in, the spirit is indomitable and abundant, fully aware of and aligned with a power greater than the vessel for which it inhabits. We are all this glorious combination of spirit and body.

The biology and conditioning of our nervous system develops within a blueprint of scarcity and fear. When we default to this fear, our thoughts, emotions and resulting behaviours emerge as projections of the old belief systems connected to our unhealed wounds. Our spiritual self is the conduit that connect us to a power greater than our physical selves, reminding us of our wholeness and enabling genuine and compassionate connection to each other and to the planet that hosts us.

Without spirit, the efforts of the body lack inspiration. Without buy-in from the body, the spirit becomes trapped, unable to actualize in the physical world

When immersed in a world fixated on adornments and the appraisal of others, our orientation to spirit shifts. The spontaneous, spirit-filled self feels incongruent with what the external world demands. As a result, the spirit becomes a threat to the body’s felt need to gain the approval of the conditioned world. As the spirit grows dimmer with each layer of conditioning, the defensive nervous system becomes our primary concern. Spiritual distress signals become a source of anxiety to the body, reminding us we have forgotten who we are. As a result, the relentless need to DO lacks spiritual inspiration, eroding our emotional energy stores, and causing dis-ease. When separated, out of tune with spirit, the body cannot navigate the world objectively. This separation leads to spiritual distress until we come back into tune. Tuning in is the process of re-learning what it means to be a human BEing.

Addressing spiritual distress begins with stepping into a new blueprint, moving from fear to abundance. We do this by finding containers that promote spiritual expression, enabling us to feel safe to BE authentic. In time, we regain the trust necessary to enable the body to come into right relationship with the spirit. With this trust, the conditioning falls away, and the spirit grows brighter. We reach a tipping point, the resistance of the body dissipates, enabling us to see the conditioning for what it is. We set our BEing free from the illusive conditions of the physical world, and our orientation shifts from fear to abundance. From this space, the spirit informs the DOing of the body, providing the ease, confidence, direction, and inspiration to live abundantly.

Attachment reflects how securely rooted we are in our ‘real’ selves (congruence) and how confident we are to navigate life’s challenges (sense of coherence).

I’ve been exploring the concept of attachment for some time now and just recently developed a felt sense of secure attachment, perhaps for the first time.  Neither I nor my parents experienced secure attachment as children, evident in part by how we overcompensate, fixating on DOing instead of BEing, fuelled by a fear of not being good enough. After minding this area for some time now, I’ve begun attaching to my inner child and mirroring this same attachment with my children. This more secure form of attachment emerges from a place of abundance instead of fear and the ripple effects are astounding. 

As it turns out, learning to securely attach to myself and others is breaking a generational cycle of trauma born from the disconnection and insecurity I felt in my developmental years.  Investing in this ability to securely attach deepens my roots, providing the groundedness necessary to move more confidently in the world, which is enabling me to pass this same gift to my offspring.   

Before I get too far, I want to be clear that very few people securely attach all the time.  Most of us struggle with attachment and the process to gain more security is often slow and subtle.  When we get stressed, the vast majority of humans will tend toward anxious or avoidant behaviours – this is normal!

In childhood, our ability to attach to a primary parent or guardian forms the basis of our adult attachment style (Bowlby, 2012). Our ability to connect to a primary caregiver as children impacts our ability to forge healthy connections to others as adults.  If we felt rejected by our caregiver’s inability to emotionally connect, we tend to cling (anxiously) to others.  If we felt smothered because they relied on us to meet their emotional needs, we tend to retreat (avoid) from others.  Our attachment develops in stages ranging from immature dependent security, completely dependent on others for security, to mature dependant security, where we can give and receive in our connection to others from a secure sense of self (Blatz, 1967). For example, those who are closer to the dependant side of the spectrum tend to come from a glass half empty approach, yearning to be filled by others.  Those closer to mature dependant security tend to come from a glass half full perspective, connecting from a more grounded and optimistic place. People able to progress through the stages and come to mature dependent security will form mutually interdependent relationships in their adulthood (Blatz, 1967).  Interdependence is a balance of recognizing our dependence on others and honouring our independence as a unique individual. 

Because of our progression through the attachment stages, in adulthood we will gravitate to one of three broad attachment categories;

• avoiding attachment,
• secure attachment (springing from perceived unconditional positive regard as a child),
• anxious attachment.

The latter two (avoidant and anxious attachment) spring from perceived conditional regard and rejection as a child (Bretherton & Munholland, 1999). Children with repetitive and/or unresolved trauma may also develop avoidant attachment styles even when experiencing unconditional positive regard (Morina, Schnyder, Schick, Nickerson, & Bryant, 2016). Unfortunately, most of us fall along the edges of the attachment spectrum, either avoiding intimacy or anxiously attaching to others, with those who easily form secure attachments in the minority. The good news is that attachment styles are not fixed traits. Like most of our inner workings when we come to recognize our attachment style and the patterns (either negative or positive) that spring from it, we have a new opportunity to heal the old wounds at the roots.  In time and with mindful practice, we can re-orient ourselves and our relationship.

When insecurities present, those on the more anxious end of the spectrum tend to feverishly seek others to anchor to, fixating on relationships from a blueprint of scarcity, which often fuels anxiety and co-dependent relations.  When those on the avoidant end feel insecure, they are far more likely to lean back, disconnecting from external relationships, feeling too unsafe to expose their felt sense of vulnerability.  In between these two tendencies, in the middle of the attachment spectrum, is secure attachment.

What does secure attachment look and feel like?  Ideally, as children we can fall into a felt sense of safety, where we feel unconditionally positively regarded (UPR) by someone we trust and look up to.  This felt UPR makes us feel inherently worthy, separate from our ability to perform and achieve.   When we believe we are inherently worthy, we become self-compassionate, mirroring this same UPR inwardly.  By feeling safe enough to securely attach to another trusted human, we also learn attach to our inner world, promoting a greater ability to self-soothe when we experience challenges.   

When securely attached to self and others, the calamities of life are less threatening. They may be noisy and distracting, but they are distinct from the signal of who we are.  From this place, because we know who we are and the wealth of resources within us, we can confidently manage challenges (the noise). When we lack this attachment to self, we are prone to over-identify with the noise that presents, confusing who we are with unpredictable events and opinions that are largely out of our control.  From this insecure place, we often fixate on DOing to compensate for the dis-ease we feel inside.  Our actions emerge from a fear of not adding up, afraid we will not be good enough if we stop DOing.  From this fearful place, we grasp onto substances, events, and busyness to soothe us.  How we relate to others from this place of fear emerges in avoidant (emotionally disconnected) or anxious (emotionally clinging to others) attachment tendencies.

What are your attachment tendencies?

Using the following lists of characteristics, adapted from Wei, Russell, Mallinckrodt and Vogel’s Experiences in Close Relationship Scale (2007), notice which category you most resonate with. Consider your experience of past relationships and currents ones. Remember, our attachment tendencies are not fixed and we can move either direction on the spectrum, based on past adversities, our sense of coherence, and our degree of congruence.

Those closer to the anxious attachment end of the spectrum are more likely to resonate with these characteristics:

• I need a lot of reassurance that I am loved by my partner.
• I find that my partner/friends don’t want to get as close as I would like.
• My desire to be very close sometimes scares people away.
• I often worry about being abandoned.
• I worry that romantic partners won’t care about me as much as I care about them.
• I get frustrated if romantic partners are not available when I need them.
• When it comes to goodbyes, and many other transitions, I draw it out, afraid to let go.

Tips to soften anxious tendencies:

You are more likely to focus on external stimuli than internal stimuli. As a result, subtle feelings often go unnoticed until they build and compound, until they feel intense and overwhelming. Stress/anxiety emerges from a fear of not getting our basic need for love and acceptance met. Taking a step back from the intensity of the emotion enables you to keep the feeling in perspective, investigate it with a sense of curiosity, and with mindfulness practice and time, to re-orient yourself. If you cannot gain perspective (objectivity through non-attachment), talking to an objective other, such as a friend or counsellor, can be helpful.  As Fred Rogers once said, “anything that’s human is mentionable, and anything that is mentionable can be more manageable. When we can talk about our feelings, they become less overwhelming, less upsetting, and less scary.”

Practice attending to what is happening internally simultaneously with what is happening with the other person. Holding both experiences (the inner and the outer) connects you to your inner world, enabling it to ground you as you navigate the external.  Notice any tendencies to take the blame for conflict in relationships. When you take responsibility for something, take a step back, get curious, and see if you can come at the situation from a self-compassionate and impartial perspective.

Besides strengthening your connection to the inner world, take stock of your external resources and relationships. Try relationally diversifying yourself, which prevents you from putting all of your relational eggs/needs in one basket/person.

Those who tend to avoid attachment are more likely to resonate with these characteristics:

• I rarely turn to my romantic partner in times of need.
• I want to get close to my partner, but I keep pulling back.
• I don’t often turn to my partner for things, including comfort and reassurance.
• I try to avoid getting too close to my partner.
• I don’t often discuss my problems and concerns with my partner.
• I often feel nervous when partners get too close to me.
• I dislike saying goodbye, and many other lingering transitions, I’d much rather avoid the emotions associated.

Tips to soften avoidant tendencies:

You are more likely to retreat inwardly, keeping emotions to yourself, and to ruminate on fears (worry) when uncertainty presents. Practice interrupting this pattern by talking about your emotions to another person or if more comfortable, talk to the emotion.  Talking about or to the emotion creates a space between the emotion and the essence of who you are, enabling you to notice when ruminating, to question the veracity of the thoughts behind the emotion and to stop over identifying with it.  If you cannot gain objectivity (unable to step back) from strong emotions and negative thoughts, try interrupting the stress response by reaching out to connect with someone, or shake it off with a bout of intense exercise, or bathe in nature, or any activity that sparks desire and promotes relaxation.  Working with your biology and exploring tools that mitigate stress improves your sense of coherence (confidence to manage external events) and practicing vulnerability and self-expression promotes congruence (confidence to tap into inner resources). 

Starting out slow is important, ensuring that you don’t suffer from a vulnerability hangover, which can make matters more challenging by activating the stress response.  Small steps keep you moving forward, practicing in ways that feel safe and that enable you to remain objective, or at least to maintain windows of objectivity.  If you take too large of a step, you may find your felt need to retreat (stress response) overrides your efforts. If you retreat, that’s okay, it’s part of the learning process; this is how we learn to titrate the process, moving only as fast as we feel safe to do so.

Trust takes time and part of gaining trust is learning to trust yourself and the pace in which you feel safe moving. Experiment with different techniques, with getting close to others. Try leaning on people in small ways, investigate how it feels. If feelings get intense, practice self-compassion and self-kindness by allowing yourself to take a step back. Taking a break, even stepping back, is not necessarily retreating (although without awareness it can be), rather it can be an opportunity to create space between the event and the emotions activated by the event. The desire to retreat/emotionally dissociate comes from fear. We can catch ourselves before we retreat by noticing when it is happening (catch the felt anxiety or sense of panic emerging) and acting (stepping back) before we react.

To process, digest, and heal the wounds beneath our avoidant tendencies, it helps to identify a ritual such as a stress mitigation tool, hobby you enjoy, time in nature, or a person (or animal) that provides a sense of emotional safety for you. To clarify, we use rituals in these moments to connect and empower, not to distract us from acknowledging and tending to emotional wounds. Rituals cue us, enabling us to find order in moments that feel chaotic. We all need a certain degree of order, grounding us in times of chaos (a component of sense of coherence). These safe spaces, cued and created by ritual, provide an environment where we feel safe to be vulnerable. It takes vulnerability to feel our emotions. We must feel our emotions to walk through grievance and suffering. On the other side of many of the uncomfortable feelings that arise in us is healing is from the suffering associated with old wounds.

Finally, when the intense feelings emerge, take notice. Once you notice, create space by engaging in a comforting ritual or talking to a trusted friend/loved one. When we create safe spaces and cultivate a sense of curiosity, we are more likely to observe and even welcome the experience as it is (rather than resisting it as it is or avoiding it altogether).

Whatever your tendencies, remember to tune in and take your time.  Moving too fast will slow you down.  Moving slow and steady promotes a sense of safety, keeping us connected to our bodies and to our inner resources.  If you find yourself activated, take a step back, reground, reconnect, and celebrate how far you’ve come.  From this optimistic and gracious place, you’ll be ready to step back into the flow.    

Inspired by Crosbie and Helen Watler. Thank you for helping me tune in. For reminding me who I am when I forget…

Many of us are conditioned to avoid anxiety with a variety of creative distracting and sedating strategies. However, on this path toward greater congruence, anxiety can be an ally, signalling us when stray from our values and calling. ‘Signal anxiety’ is a barometer and it requires enough bothersome intensity to get our attention. The term was initially defined as an instinctual tension that occurs when we fear of losing love and acceptance (Freud, 1926; Freud, 1937). It happens the moment we stop feeling that we are unconditionally positively regarded by self or others. Soon enough, because we forgot our inherent worth, we lose sight of who we are and our inherent worth (the signal). As a result, we turn our attention to feverishly decorate ourselves with external assets (the noise), fixating on external approval to gain security. The noise is the conditioning (fixating on DOING and GETTING), which can easily drown out the signal. The noise often presents in the ‘should’ statements we prescribe to ourselves and others.

As a reframe on our typical fear of anxiety, viewing it as a signal that promotes congruence can prevent it from feeling like a stressful threat. From this more objective and heartful space, we have a greater ability to receive message. The message may be difficult to hear, much like it is difficult to listen to an instrument that’s out of tune, but it’s purpose is benevolent, illuminating an area of incongruence for us to tend to. Tending to the incongruence enables us to tune back in, to remember who we are.  As we ground back into our values and calling, our fixation on DOING dissolves and we can get back to BEING.

HOW DO I MAKE IT GO AWAY?

The signal is the frequency that flows from our inner world, providing the inner resources, wisdom, and courage to navigate the outer. We lose access to these inner resources when we aren’t tuned in. If we get out of tune with our signal (remembering who we are), we become ungrounded and out of fear, we turn our focus to attain external security.  When this happens, anxiety is the messenger, signalling that we have forgotten who we are. Signal anxiety disappears when we remember who we are, our inherent worth, beneath cultural conditioning and unrelated to past behavior.

Learning to Breathe into the Noise

When surrounded by noise, we are unlikely to distinguish the signal.  To gain the space (non-attachment) necessary to step back so we can tune into our signal, we must first recognize when we are consumed by it.  Once we see our attachment, we see it as an other, enabling us to dis-identify and eventually let go. As we let go, a space develops between the felt (self or other imposed) conditions prescribed by the world and the noise (pressure to earn our worth by doing). When we dis-identify, we are more likely to see it as a neutral other, rather than a threat.   From this quieter, less threatening space, we tune back into our signal, navigating the outer world from this more meaningful, connected, empowered, and resourced inner space.

Breathing into the Noise:

• Bring up a situation in your current life where you are feeling insecure.  Continue thinking into this situation until you notice an anxious feeling in your body.  When the anxiety presents, get curious as you note where it is, what it feels like, and how it presents itself.

• Imagine this felt sense has a double walled balloon around it.  With each deep inhale and exhale fill the space between the two outer walls.  As you are breathing with this visual, lean in to receive the message that is waiting to be heard.  If you find yourself lost in noisy thoughts, go back to breathing into the space between the two outer walls, cultivating more space (non-attachment). From this more spacious place, revisit the message.

• Once the message is delivered, continue breathing into the space until it is so big that you can visualize the balloon slowly floating away.  Now that we are aware of the noise, seeing it for what it is, we are more able to distinguish it from the signal.

Learning to Tune into the Signal

When we get out of tune with our inherent worth, our values, and our calling, we are likely to look for our security in the outer world. When we can’t love and accept ourselves (lacking self-compassion), we look to others, settling for conditional acceptance and worth. Tuning back in to our signal is about remembering the inherent worth of who we are, beneath our conditioned selves. How do you remember who you are? What resource reminds you that you are inherently worthy and loved?  

Tuning into unconditional positive regard (signal):

• Bring someone or something to mind, perhaps a person (present or past), your wiser self, or an animal, or a spiritual source. It is not important who or what it is, what is important is how they resonate with your inner signal. The more it ushers you into a felt sense of unconditional positive regard, the more likely it will allow you to sink back into tune with the signal.

• Taking it a step further, engage in a conversation, a prayer of sorts. Gain a felt sense of BEING with the source (feeling unconditional positive regard), and begin a conversation. Tell it what is on your heart, what is worrying you. Stay connected to the felt sense of love and compassion, allowing you to stay connected to your heart. When finished saying what needs to be said (releasing shame), take some time to listen and observe, bask in the moment and celebrate yourself for walking through this exercise. With practice, you will come to know the voice that flows from signal.  This wise, grounded voice will remind you who you are. Practice just being with this source, engaging in prayer and really listening to the wisdom that emerges.

From this more grounded place, we can step back from the noise, so we can navigate it from a more non-attached and empowered place. Some days comforting affirmations will come to mind. Some days, you will rest in the quietness. Other days, the conditioning (noise) will be too loud to distinguish the signal, making the experience more difficult. Every experience provides an opportunity to expand awareness, cultivate non-attachment when we need it most, and to continue practicing self-compassion (especially, in the difficult moments) as we journey forward.

Written by: Phillip Dames

I recently sold a successful Financial Planning practice where I designed and managed nearly every facet of people’s financial lives. I came to know what makes a financial plan successful and what causes it to fail. Consistently, there were two factors that determined whether the retirement plan would succeed or require constant tweaking to avoid failure: time and discipline (sticking to the plan).

The earlier we invest for retirement, the more time we expose the funds to the incredible power of compounding interest. Clients who invest early have a higher likelihood of accomplishing their goals and a greater ability to enjoy retirement. Research shows it’s not about how much you invest, but how early, thus allowing the time necessary for the fruits of your labour to ripen.

As an advisor, one of my most difficult responsibilities was keeping clients on their path, sticking to their objectives. A client may spend too much or not save as much as planned, and it was my duty to make sure they knew. When the stock market gets volatile, emotions flair and fear often drives clients to hit the panic button, ready to sell everything, even though that would run counter to the long-term plan. As hard as it is to do, research shows time and time again, we are better off to keep money invested in a well-balanced portfolio and to avoid timing the ups and downs.  Yet, when the stock market declines, we often ignore the research, falling prey to the unchecked fears that prevent us from ‘sticking to the plan.’

Investing in Self-Compassion: Just like financial health, the same principles apply to emotional health: start investing as soon as possible and stay on the path. Self-compassion is a personal resource/asset that provides an unbelievable return on investment. I began investing by incrementally shifting my focus away from a trying to change things on the surface (habits, others, material possessions) to focus on cultivating unconditional positive regard for myself and others.  Ironically, from this new space, habits that no longer serve me are effortlessly falling away.

As I began investing in this self-compassionate process, I quickly realized that to offer unconditional compassion to others, I must first be able to offer and fully receive it to and from myself. I’m learning how to do this by reframing how I talk to myself through a kind, loving lens. Leading up to this shift I would often talk negatively to myself or question my ability as a father or husband. I wasn’t aware of the habitual negative dialogue until I could step back and offer myself a different point of view. The harsh discussions I was having in my head would sadly spill over into other relationships with those closest to me, especially my children. I would often catch myself talking to them like I was talking to myself and it hurt to realize that that negativity was spilling over to the lives of those closest to me. Something needed to change, and I had no idea it was so simple and so joyful.

As we learn to access our emotions, creating an environment where compassion is ever-present is vital. This allows you to sit with your emotions and view them as a valued messenger, not a threat, providing important information to consider. Once I can establish that they are just emotions, I do not feel threatened by it. Because I’ve created this safe home within, where I feel deeply grounded in love and acceptance for self, emotions now feel more like visitors to dialogue with rather than threatening strangers. Don’t get me wrong, the process is not perfect and it can feel messy and effortful, especially at first. However, with time and commitment, as with any new habit, effort wanes and soon we catch ourselves talking compassionately to the emotion, without having to consciously do so.

I’ve broken my process down into four steps in an effort to help you establish your own path:

Step one: Create a mantra. This mantra is deeply felt and believed by myself and affirmed by others close to me and it’s easy to remember. I had a professor in college once say “you should be able to easily recite your mission statement at all times, even if someone woke you in the middle of the night and put a gun to your head.” I wanted my mantra to be that simple and ingrained.

My Mantra:

“You are inherently whole. You have all the tools and resources to be an amazing father, husband, and friend”

Step two: Remind yourself of the mantra and practice on yourself.

I am a visual person and when I see things more and more it gets more imbedded in my mind. Once I came up with my mantra, I placed it in several places as a reminder…this way it was consistently on my mind. I put the mantra on my phone background (sad I know) and on my bathroom mirror with a dry erase marker. I rarely look in the bathroom mirror, but for this work, I find it helpful to really embody the mantra. In a household of two high-energy kiddos, I relish in the stillness of the shower, where thoughts and feelings can emerge uninterrupted. Often, before I get in the shower, I will look in the mirror and recite the mantra back to myself while looking at myself eye to eye. Sometimes I will say it with a serious, affirming face, and sometimes I will say it with a joyful, smiling face. When I recite it, I do so in a compassionate, loving way and it is delivered in such a way that I believe it. Then I can get into the shower and have a conversation with myself with a self-compassionate approach.

Step three: Practice talking to yourself through a compassionate lens and be open to who you talk to.

This step can unfold however you are most comfortable. For me, it is important to be alone when having these talks with myself, or whoever I am talking to. I need to enter almost a meditative state to step back enough to have these conversations inside my head, so it is important for me to not have distractions. When I started practicing, I would visualize myself (today) sitting across from myself (20 or 30 years later) somewhere outside. Often, we would sit on two stumps in the forest looking eye to eye or just sitting side-by-side, looking into the forest. I wanted to have these conversations in an area where I felt myself, and I feel myself most in nature.

It is important to be open to talking to someone other than yourself. To be witnessed and to practice receiving unconditional positive regard by another is powerful and empowering. This could be a relationship in your life with someone who provides you with compassion, comfort, and safety. It may be God, a mother, father, brother, sister, friend, or grandparent. Regardless of whom you choose, it is important that they are capable of providing kindness and compassion when you need it most.

Early on when I started having these talks with myself, I would ask my older self to recite the mantra to my current day self while we sat in the forest. Sometimes he would recite it several times, but whenever he said it, I could feel the truth behind it. I would sit, listen, and think about it. By my older self reciting the mantra, it would often spark a discussion between the two of us and in the beginning, I would often question my older self and the mantra out of guilt, shame or fear, but my older self kept loving and affirming until I was convinced it was true in that moment. In that moment I know I am whole, by offering myself unconditional compassion, I can then offer it to others.

As these discussions with myself evolved, I would venture into asking my older self questions to check in and see how I was doing. By asking myself these questions, I was subconsciously testing the container with myself, making sure it really is a safe environment to express emotions that long to be felt. It is similar to a relationship with a new friend you want to get to know on a deeper level; taking small steps to lead to a deeper relationship, rather than huge dramatic steps that might derail the relationship.

In my current relationship with self, I try to do at least one check-in per day, usually in the evenings before I fall asleep or while I shower, or both. I find those times are a peaceful way to connect with myself. If anything is worrying me, it is an excellent time to process it through a lens of compassion. Some questions I will often ask my older self or a topic of conversation are:

• How am I doing as a father?
• How am I doing as a husband?
• I am feeling (insert emotion or physical sensation), can we talk about it? In these conversations I find it very helpful to explore how my physical body is feeling before I focus on emotions.
• I have had this thought on my mind a lot and I would like to talk about it.
• I have had a rough day and feel bad about how I reacted to something someone did and I didn’t treat them kindly. Can we talk about that?

Regardless of the questions I ask or things we talk about, my older self (or whoever I am talking to) typically brings things back to my mantra: You are whole. You have all the tools you need to be an amazing father. By starting with my mantra, it allows us both to view things through a compassionate lens while we discuss it. When I feel grounded in low stimulus setting, a dialogue between my current self (CS) with my older self (OS) sounds like this:

OS: Hey bud, is there anything specific you are feeling right now that you want to talk about or has anything been on your mind quite a bit lately?

CS: I am feeling shame and guilt right now.

OS: Where do you feel it and what does it feel like?

CS: It feels like a knot in my belly and then my heart races and I start to sweat. The shame and guilt often evolves into fear.

OS: What do you think it is related to?

CS: Earlier today when I asked the kids to clean up the entry way, I had to ask 4 times before they responded. I yelled pretty loud, and it scared them. Even after they took action, I was not kind and I feel ashamed about how I treated them. At times like that, when emotions are that raw, I worry I’m going to damage them and that scares me. After I settled down, I apologized for raising my voice and my lack of kindness. It was an opportunity to show that I make mistakes too, quite a lot actually.  I am learning how to own my part, learn from the past, release shame, and do my best to make amends whenever possible.  I can now see that mistakes are an opportunity to provide grace, forgiveness, and encouragement when I, and we, need it most.   

OS: How do you feel after you offer an apology to them and talk to them?

CS: I always feel better. It diffuses a lot of the shame I feel, but often the shame comes back at night when there is silence, which is why I like having these talks at night. 

OS: Bud, I want you know something. I have been observing you with the kids and the personal work you have been doing and I could not be prouder of you. Please know that I see the work you are doing. I did also see you snap at the kids and it was a little unnecessary. Maybe you could slow down and take a deep breath before you ask them for a 3rd or 4th time to complete their task. Kids easily get distracted and you operate in an ultra-efficient manner and hold others to that standard. It‘s hard for a kid to meet that standard. I know you are working on this and it’s awesome that you love your kids so much that you are efforting in this way. Everyone will express their emotions and from time to time those emotions may come out in a fashion not everyone likes. In that moment, you are choosing to do the right thing though. You are teaching your kids the value of making a wrong right. You are modelling a level of vulnerability that they will mirror back to you, promoting deeper relational connection. I appreciate you sharing that with me and remember to keep coming back to your mantra…you have all the tools you need to be an amazing dad…and you are using these tools and I see the changes happening. Keep it up man, I am proud of you! Anything else you want to talk about?

CS: I pause for a moment and think before I answer. I take a deep breath and then talk. You mentioned how I hold others to a high standard. That is something that has been on my mind a lot lately. I feel like this relates to how I frequently beating myself up emotionally for small little things that come up throughout the day.

OS: When you talk about emotionally beating yourself up, how does that feel?

CS: I feel sadness.

OS:  When you feel sadness, where do you feel it?

CS:  In my cheeks and in my chest.

OS:  Physically, what does it feel like?

CS:  My cheeks feel heavy, almost saggy.  In my chest, the feeling spans across my shoulders and down about 6 inches. It feels heavy, like there is a rock in my chest.

OS: What do you think you feel sadness for?

CS: I feel sad for myself. That I would be so hard on myself for making a mistake. For berating myself for something as small as spilling a cup of coffee. There is not much grace there.

OS: What about when the kids make a mistake or when they don’t meet your high standards? Is your reaction to self similar to your reaction when the kids make a mistake?

CS: I squirm in my seat a little…Hmmm….great question. Sometimes yes and sometimes no. But in certain situations, yes my reactions have been harsh with shaming undertones and they absolutely do not deserve that.

OS: Do you see how the two are related? If you are kinder and more compassionate to yourself, then that compassion will naturally spill into the relationships with those close to you. If you talk to yourself with a compassionate voice, you will use that same voice with others too. The really amazing thing is you are already working on this. This is all part of the process. Us having this talk is exactly the process and I am so proud of you. Keep it up man, I can already see some big changes.

CS: Thank you for the encouragement. I can genuinely say that my interactions with the kids and my partner have drastically changed since we started these talks. It’s strange and hard to describe, but I feel a level of compassion and patience with the kids that I didn’t know was possible.  These conversations are now the lubricant keeps me connected, fulfilled, and motivated to live wholly, inwardly and outwardly. Thank you for always being here for me.

OS: I am here for you man…whenever wherever. What else, anything else you want to talk about?

CS: I sit and think for a few seconds and answer…I think I got everything off my chest that I wanted to for today. Thanks man.

OS: You bet.  I so enjoy these talks.

Step Four: Integrate the discussions you have with yourself, or whoever it is you talk to, into everyday life

I now find I am spontaneously initiating conversations with myself, making me more self-compassionate throughout the day. I practice by noticing when I go down a rabbit hole of negative self-talk. I then counteract it by reciting my mantra. By doing this, I remember that I am whole and I am doing my best with the tools I have in that moment. By reciting my mantra, it creates a space of positivity and compassion, rather than negativity. In this space I can step back, gaining the objectivity necessary to consciously and kindly shift the thought pattern.

Since I started these compassionate conversations with my wiser self, it’s transformed how I relate to others. I naturally began holding space for these same compassionate conversations with others and at times, I get to then see them mirror it inwardly and outwardly. This is particularly evident with my partner and I, and in how our kids are relating to themselves and to each other. It is infectious! Those near and dear draw closer and in that new deep connection is a richness, joy, and capacity to heal that I had no idea was possible. All this by simply changing the conversation I have with self.

The challenge: Create a space for yourself to explore your relationship with you. Envision a comfortable location where you can settle in as your real self. Imagine an environment where you can let your guard down. Step back from the space, exploring it as a more objective observer. Ask yourself, does this container, this conversation feel safe enough to express my emotions freely? If not, then my challenge to you is to follow the four steps above for four weeks. Follow the steps and create a path to self-compassion that embodies a felt sense of unconditional positive regard. Once your inner home (you) is at peace and full of compassion, you will see a spillover effect onto your outer home (others). Empathy, compassion, and joy will become a rewarding norm where it was previously a struggle. This path is not easy, especially at first, but the joy, compassion, and connections that emerge are more than worth the effort. For me, this small act of showing up for myself and choosing this new path I am on was one of those small tweaks that is and will continue to have dramatic positive ripple effects.Just like our finances, small changes early in our emotional health and well-being has a rapidly fast compounding effect that eventually enables us to shift. These compounding effects will unfold before your very eyes and will be some of the most beautiful instances you will ever see and feel. As you move along this beautiful path, each foot you place in front of the other is an investment in yourself and those around you. These steps may seem small and challenging to you now, but the changes you are making will impact generations.  Much gratitude!

Many of us can relate to the struggle to attend to emotions when immersed in a high stimulus and service oriented work environments (parenting young children included!). We rarely feel safe enough to express emotions to others and often lack time away from the stimulus to allow us to feel and integrate emotions as they arise. As a result, because we cannot tend to the emotion, despite feelings of urgency to do so, the stress response gets activated. When stressed, it hampers our ability to mindfully step back to navigate the perceived challenge in front of us. If the threat feels intense and we cannot respond to the associated emotion, we will likely react by flighting (anxiety and hostility), fleeing (depression and avoidance), or freezing (disconnecting and dissociating).

Consider the analogy of the phone as the emotional messenger. Emotions are telephone calls bringing us information. If we answer the phone, we receive information unique to us in that moment.

If we avoid answering the phone or turn the ringer off from a place of freeze, disconnecting from the feeling altogether, we block the message from coming through and lose the opportunity to connect to and tend to the felt needs of the body.

If we react to the ringing of the phone from a place of fight and/or flight, instead of answering it, we are likely to activate others by anxiously running around alerting everyone that the phone is ringing. We may even fuel shame by blaming ourselves for the ringing phone, or hit others over the head with the phone in anger.

If we habitually block the message, ignoring (freeze) or reacting (fight-flight) to the phone of our feelings instead of answering it, we miss an important opportunity to connect to the emotion to tend to the wound that lies beneath it.

There are two intertwining and equally important avenues to address our emotional challenges. Adapting the systemic/contextual stimuli and adapting how we respond to our internal stimuli.

Knowing that stress results from a need that feels threatened, it’s helpful to explore exactly what that need is. What we often find is that those events that really get under our skin, activating us quickly and chronically, relate to a past experience when that need was not met. As a result, the current situation gets emotionally fused with an event of the past (emotional transference). Stepping back enables us to de-fuse the situation, getting to the root of the threat so that we can properly tend to it.

The RAINN (Brach, 2013) framework provides a process to help us receive and respond to emotions. When we are empowered to tend to our emotions, we gain agency, buffering us from chronic stress and hostility both of which emerge when we feel out of control.   

Recognize: We can recognize and cultivate an awareness of when we feel anxiety, resentful, disconnected, etc.

Allow: We can allow whatever (refraining from labelling them as good or bad) emotions emerge, staying with our body as they come and go instead of resisting, distracting, or dissociating from them.

Investigate: We can cultivate a sense of non-attachment by exploring the felt sense, following its ebb and flow, noticing how it presents in the body, enabling us to get a sense of the core fear beneath it.

Non-attach: Investigating enables us to see the emotion as an ‘other’, it is not me, it is simply a messenger for me to consider. Non-attachment diffuses the sense of threat as we are no longer identified and fused to the feeling.

Nourish: Once in a position where we can step back, we can come to the emotion from a place of agency. With agency, we can provide unconditional positive regard inwardly (self-compassion), the core ingredient necessary to enable the emotion to pass and the wound beneath it to heal.

Once we tend to the emotion on the personal level, we are far more likely to feel empowered to enact the changes necessary on a cultural and systemic level. A focus on the systems and contexts surrounding us is just as important as the inner work. Working on the outer from an empowered and whole place promotes agency and ensures that the contexts in which we live and work promote or at the very least do not prevent human flourishing.

As a third generation settler, I’ve struggled to connect to truth and reconciliation efforts. While I support the cause, it has never felt applicable to my personal day to day life, until recently…

As I’ve started to awaken to who I am, separate from conditioning, I’m also awakening to the dehumanizing nature of the system we live and work in. This rigid, perfectionistic system is a living breathing result of colonization (establishing control over people/forcing assimilation to one way of being) and the truth is, I spend a good part of my day reinforcing it.

Colonization Hurts (everyone)

Ironically, I’ve spent years working on inner reconciliation, making peace with adversities from childhood, making amends with those I’ve wronged, and by updating old and unhelpful belief systems. No matter the inner work, I recognize that I walk around each day forcing myself into the neat little boxes prescribed to me from a young age. I don’t enjoy stepping into these boxes. They feel rigid, predictable, and lifeless. To fit inside, I must make myself small, quieting my inner voice so I can assimilate. Once inside the box, I don’t feel good. I feel oppressed, held down, ashamed because my real self does not feel welcome there. I must quiet my authentic self, instead taking on the ideal display prescribed to me. Inside this box, my emotions feel threatening because they tell me to get out, that it’s not safe, that I don’t fit there. I’m feeling threatened because I know these emotions are important messengers, telling me what needs to be done to heal, to self-actualize into my most authentic and best self, but, that box is all I’ve known for so many years, I’m too afraid to step out. What if I’m alone out there? What if I shed the walls around me, revealing my true self only to face rejection? And then, after ruminating on these thoughts, I freeze, immobilized from acting, and so I stay in the box. I retreat to a feeling of safety, clinging to the familiar walls, finding comfort in the predictability they bring.

In this individualist culture, we like our boxes. There is the box we work in, which we spend much of our lives serving feverishly, rewarded by extra letters that bolster the power and respect of our birth names. Then there are all the other boxes that we hop in and out of, the church box, the parent box, and the gotta look socially competent box.

I spend most of my day moving between boxes, wearing them like a well-insulated jacket and then removing it when it no longer serves it’s purpose. And what purpose is that? I want to be accepted and loved, I want to feel like I belong to something bigger than myself. Each box holds a promise of a sense of belonging and somehow, that deep primal need seems to justify putting my ‘real’ self to sleep. Waking up feels dangerous. I’ve served this colonized system for so long that I’m afraid to be free of it. I’m afraid that if I step outside of the walls, I …. I don’t know, and that not knowing terrifies me.

And then it happened…I found people like me, people that want to step out, be free, be seen and in that seeing, to love and be loved, sans boxes. Even more exciting is that this box burning work is infectious and sure enough, an entire community is emerging all around us.

It’s time to open our eyes to the consequences of colonization. We all carry trauma from this colonized system we live in. To genuinely reconcile with others, we must first face our truth, reconciling with who we are in this world and how in our sleepiness we continue to contribute to colonization.

I am coming to know that we are more than the boxes we hide in. We are so much more…