Tag: #hungryphil

Am I ambitious or never good enough?

Leave a comment

Recently, the above uncertainty stirred things up in the therapy room a few times. As usual, I didn’t have the answer.

How do I endure and balance the restlessness for more with a sense of innate worthiness and abundance?

How do I know I’m doing enough? How do I know I am enough?

Everything is good in the relationship, why do I focus on the negative and want to run?

I can’t seem to get anywhere.

Is my ambition unrealistic?

This inner churning while experienced as the same restlessness with the present, arises out of a diversity of motivations and experiences. And so, soothing this tide forward and away requires personalized and unique experiments of what ifs….suggestions like…

  • What if…you imagined you were already good enough? What does it feel like to feel accomplished, admired, complete? [Manifesting positive emotions]
  • What if … you allowed these restless feelings to rest in your heart without trying to push them away? Can you be both satisfied and dissatisfied? [ DBT, tolerating conflicting feelings]
  • What if … you had an internal dialogue between your heart, mind and gut to negotiate what level of effort is appropriate without diminishing your intellectual, emotional or instinctive needs? [Non-violent communication and community]

This week, I tried, a technique from Sensorimotor psychotherapy by Pat Ogden: reframing a survival resource. The premise of this technique is that sometimes we negatively qualify a strength. For example, “I saw how hard my mom worked and I wanted her approval so worked hard too. This way I would attract her positive attention but I also never felt good enough.” In this case, a survival resource became laden with feelings of guilty laziness. Recognizing that the productive drive was felt to be necessary at the time to connect with mom but now is no longer needed in the same form. We can reframe: “I’m not good enough” to “I value/ enjoy effort (regardless of outcome).” How does your body feel when you repeat these statements to yourself? Does one feel softer than the other? Which gives you space to allow the emotional current without feeling compelled to move, to act? Can you feel the different between acting out of love of effort instead of fear of judgement?

What works for you when you feel both exhausted and self-propelled to do more? Maybe try one of the above and let me know what worked for you.

Reference: Ogden, P. (2015). Sensorimotor psychotherapy: Interventions for trauma and attachment.

Photography by Nate Dale, New Adventure Productions.

7 Signs of Client Resistance to Change

Leave a comment

The list below is meant to help social workers identify strategies to help clients overcome resistance to change. It could also be used as a way to self-check.

  1. Silence or minimal talking during sessions (Are you avoiding?)
  2. Engaging in intellectual talk by using technical terms/abstract concepts or asking questions of a social worker that are not related to client issues or problems (Are you intellectualizing, making excuses, distracting?)
  3. Being preoccupied with past events instead of current issues (Are you ruminating, blaming, shaming?)
  4. Discounting, censoring, or editing thoughts when asked about them by a social worker (Are you minimizing the problem?)
  5. False promising (Are you appeasing others by saying you will change when you are not ready to act?)
  6. Flattering a social worker in an attempt to soften them so that the client will not be pushed to act (Are you focusing on your family and friends as ways to avoid personal effort?)
  7. Payment delays or refusals. ( Are you claiming you don’t have time or money to make the change?)

from Social Work ASWB Masters Practice Test, 2018.

photography by Nate Dale, New Adventure Productions.

Are you healthy (mentally)?

2 Comments

As a therapist, I focus on presenting issues, the problems that compel a person to sit with me. Sure, I balance these functional impairments by looking for strengths and support. Still, the focus is on identifying and repairing damage, secondary and tertiary prevention.

I came across a list of indicators for positive ego strength while studying for the licensing exam. It was refreshing to look at a list of positive mental health criteria instead of DSM5 criteria for disorders.

I found myself checking my own emotional/ ego strength. Some items on the list are easier for me than others. Check to celebrate your own strengths and ability to live a full life.

  • Acknowledging their feelings – including grief, insecurity, loneliness, anxiety
  • Not getting overwhelmed with their moods
  • Pushing forward after loss and not being paralyzed by self-pity or resentment
  • Using painful events to strengthen themselves
  • Knowing that painful feelings will eventually fade
  • Empathizing with others without trying to reduce or eliminate their pain
  • Being self-disciplined and fighting addictive urges
  • Taking responsibility for actions
  • Holding themselves accountable
  • Not blaming others
  • Accepting themselves with their limitations
  • Setting firm limits event if it means disappointing others or risking rejection
  • Avoiding people who drain them physically or emotionally
  • Tolerance of pain associated with loss, disappointment, shame or guilt
  • Forgiveness of others with feelings of compassion rather than anger
  • Persistence and perseverance in pursuit of goals
  • Openness, flexibility, creativity in learning to adapt

From Social Work ASWB Masters Exam Guide by Dawn Apgar, 2018.

Pausing or Stuck?

2 Comments

How can I move on and grow when I’m back at home with my parents?

…I’ve been asked various versions of this question as a counselor.

At best the question exposes the uncomfortable struggle between needing support and wanting autonomy. At worst it hides destructive shame and self-doubt.

Yes, I answer.. this is your question, emphasizing the first important part of the question “How can YOU move and grow … merely qualifying the question with “when back at home with my parents?” Sometimes, a slight shift in tone starts to open up possibilities, a space to grow.

First of all, I want to continue, autonomy is a myth. We all need different levels of help. (Reality testing)

Second, ask yourself “how can I move and grow today?” Find yourself again and again. Imagined paths to independence may look a bit different at first until you find your horizon. (Partializing)

Third, how do you want to grow? Towards self-sufficiency, autonomy, independent social life, self-management and direction? Redefine the sentence for yourself: “A grown up is ……….” (Expressive Arts/ working with introjects)

Some days it may feel like a restorative pause in the rhythm of your life. Other days it may feel like a constraining reversal that propels you forward.

Often, you may just feel stuck.

In any case, it’s the question “how can I ________?” that matters. The if/when qualifiers are secondary. (empowerment)

When I find myself feeling stuck, I try to find some small way to move, to wiggle slightly, maybe even just reach up my arms to stretch, something, anything to keep holding the possibility “How can I…….?”

What do you do when you feel stuck? How do you cope and keep moving?

Hope you move through your day with ease. Thank you for reading.

Hungryphil

After filling your cup

Leave a comment

“What does the opposite of a seizure feel like for you? What are you doing when you are comfortable?”

“I am sipping coffee in the morning. The kids are off to school and it’s quiet.”

“Do you have a favorite coffee cup? Tomorrow morning try holding your coffee cup in your lap, feel the weight and texture of the cup, focus on how warm it is. Notice the steam rising. Take a sip. Follow the sip down into your belly. Feel the warmth travel.

Practice digesting quiet and easy moments like these. Grow the small joys, like following a sip of warm coffee in the morning. ”

Sometimes tea for me

May you fill your cup and follow your warmth today,

Hungryphil

Cooking in the time of Corona

Leave a comment

The restlessness to get back to “normal” was so vivid for me yesterday as we past a local water park teeming with children and families. No masks, no 6 feet distance, no indication of a pandemic. It was an almost nostalgic surreal vision. Addressing our level of comfort with safety and health is now personal and subjectively enforced (the effectiveness of masks-handwashing-social distance use has been proven). Without public mandate, it can be confusing and challenging to self-monitor and so easy to judge the choices of others. Everyday warrants revision of the boundaries to the question, “am I protecting others from viruses I am hosting?”

Within this uncertainty and confusion, I found comfort in the regularity of meals together and the kitchen. So, today I offer a food retrospective of my last three months in social isolation with family. As I watched drenched children scurry back to the water-slide steps, I was thinking about the last few months at home, things I miss, things I enjoyed. I miss eating out: the sound of dishes, muffled conversations, laughter, smells, wide exotic and familiar views, and sitting across from loved ones and friends. But, I can’t complain, what a privilege its been to cook for family who will disperse again too soon.

Hoping you continue to find your way to comforting routine as we move through the phases and cycles of Covid-19,

Hungryphil

Scorched Paella and the Pandemic

4 Comments

I have the privilege of staying safe at home during this pandemic. Comfortable, well-fed and loved, I’m basking in the simplicity of making meals for my daughters. I can’t complain.

As a nerdy introvert lost in my own thoughts, my social scene has not altered much except for lunches with my trusted tiny circle of friends.

But.

I do miss being alone with others.

You know….that moment when you feel a part of a stream of humanity, no titles, roles, names, just human. I’ve felt this connection when noticing shoes on the subway, tired heads nodding on a train commute home, standing impatiently at the checkout counter, sitting at a coffee shop glowing with lit laptop screens, waiting with anxious others at doctors offices and airports. I miss humanity.

This social isolation has taught me the value of those accidental encounters of sharing space.

I find myself saying thank-you louder when grocer loads my car and deliberately saying “hi” to people across the street when on walks.

Last night’s experimental recipe was paella in an attempt to conjure the excitement and warmth of Barcelona in my Indiana kitchen.

I scorched it.

It was cooking beautifully. The onion, garlic, parsley, tomato mixture coating the rice kernels. I added the chicken and shrimp too early. The rice wasn’t cooked yet. In order to make up for the mistake, I decided to put a lid on it. Not a good idea. I couldn’t smell the burning that was happening on the bottom.

Yikes! Thankfully, I was able to lift most of rice out of the burnt layer. No roastie-toastie rice layer for me this time. Still good, still better than edible, but less than what it could have been with patience.

The point is: I rushed.

As much as I want to spend a day at a coffee shop quietly working and writing with others, rushing it will burn my paella, my people, what I’m trying to bloom and nurture. This impulse to rush threatens so much.

As we feel the impulse to rush towards each other, are we simply rushing out of discomfort?

We are only limited, finite humans plagued with blurry farsight and muted insight. Asking the big questions of food insecurity, climate change, health care, education, political representation is too overwhelming. Opening up businesses feels like a quick solution. Will opening up businesses and exposing people to the virus kill more people, or will social starvation from isolation kill more people? Death by interaction or isolation? If we have a choice, how many of us are we willing to sacrifice in the name of a return to “normalcy.”

I don’t know.

We are all uncomfortable with the physical isolation and worried. The collapse of the economy or the collapse of humanity, are these the same?

If this were a therapy session, I would say, “Let’s sit with this for a moment.”

With the paella, I made a mistake by rushing to return the meats to the pan. I needed to accept that, instead of trying to rush the rice too. I scorched a half of my pan, saved another half. I can’t afford to scorch half of humanity, just because I miss humanity.

I know I’m rambling. Nothing makes sense. Thank you for listening.

Sending you loving thoughts out there. Missing you,

Hungryphil

Here is the link to the paella recipe, modify as needed, just don’t rush 🙂

https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/tyler-florence/the-ultimate-paella-recipe-2117628

Hungry Philosopher and Starving Artists

Leave a comment

Imagine,

( you are good at that my artist and creative friends),

you walk into my counseling office.

You seat yourself in a red mid-century modern chair. No arm rests. You fold your hands on your lap and notice that you are sitting upright. You allow yourself to lean into the back support. You look around for clues to what might happen next: the white board, the desk, the pens, the walls, me across from you. Your eyes rest on the rug under your feet. I ask you…..

How do you feel about your art?

You are most welcome to share your thoughts in the comments below or just hold them gently in your heart.

Hungry philosophers and starving artists are always looking to fill themselves with meaning and beauty. How do you endure the uncertain tide of human feelings, starting with your own? How do you allow as Betye Saar says “creative grieving”?

Artist Betye Saar with a background that includes social work and design, my hero, talks about risking ridicule in efforts to raise universal consciousness and in dealing with personal emotions. I wonder how she would answer my soft question. In a way it maybe easier to talk about the role of art for society than the role of art for you or your relationship to your own art.

“I think the chanciest thing is to put spirituality in art,” Ms. Saar says as she gently shifts elements of the assemblage around, trying this combination and that. “Because people don’t understand it. Writers don’t know what to do with it. They’re scared of it, so they ignore it. But if there’s going to be any universal consciousness-raising, you have to deal with it, even though people will ridicule you.”

“And you have to deal with personal emotions, because they’re there,” she added. “I think people are afraid of those too. My younger sister’s husband died this year. I said to her, you’ve got to start making something beautiful. Beauty is a form of spirituality. Once you start making something with your hands, the healing starts. I call this creative grieving.”

– Betye Saar

The Nourishing Opposite

Leave a comment

Yogic psychology says there’s more. Encountering these stuck and painful knots is the path. This perspective teaches us that we aren’t stuck, we’re only identifying with less satisfying “things.” One remedy, Patanjali tells us, is to look for the opposite (II:33). I think of it as the Nourishing Opposite (Fay, 2010) not just any opposite, but something that will actually invite more nourishment into our experience. Pain, then, is a process of pointing out the way to remember and return ourselves to our true nature. In integrating opposites, holding these opposites simultaneously (Bryant, 2009; Miller, 2014), a third higher synthesis occurs (Patanjali 2.48), in which suffering is eased.

Fay, Deirdre. Attachment-Based Yoga & Meditation for Trauma Recovery: Simple, Safe, and Effective Practices for Therapy (pp. 16-17). W. W. Norton & Company. Kindle Edition.

The prescription to nourish the opposite when feeling stuck is the same process as identifying presenting issues and corresponding client goals. In seeking the opposite of what pains us, we seek joy. Treatment plans that include objectives, interventions and modalities chart the path of the nourishing opposite. Together we seek ease for the anxious, joy for the grieving, elevation for the depressed, reality for the delusional, focus for the inattentive. Therapy invites the nourishing opposite.

What pains you? What is this pain’s opposite? Can you invite the nourishing opposite?

As a therapist-intern, I find myself sometimes wobbly having absorbed client anxieties, fears, angers, sadness and confusion. Why am I angry? Is this anger even mine? Is this pain mine? Am I mirroring client feelings? Or maybe my feelings are responding, like a song?

I have been feeling irritable this weekend. What is the nourishing opposite? Feeling agreeable? How do I feel agreeable? Accept what is, accept that for now I’m feeling irritable, sensitive, overwhelmed, cranky without shame.

Writing helps me. Sharing with you nourishes me. I already feel a bit more relaxed, allowing myself to feel irritable and agreeable at the same time.

Now you try it. What feeling is bothering you? What is the opposite? How do you invite the nourishing opposite? How can you sit with the contradiction?

This takes practice, doesn’t it…

May we return to our own nature by listening to our discomfort (over and over again),

Hungryphil

Photography by Nate Dale – New Adventure Production