GRATITUDE

I grew up celebrating Thanksgiving Day -- a cornucopia overflowing with autumnal harvest as its symbol.

 

 

We would give thanks for our bountiful table, as the Pilgrims at Plymouth I 1621 gave thanks to the Native Americans for their first abundant harvest.

Although little more than a commemoration of an historical event, the Day was not really an exercise in gratitude for me. This came years later with the acquisition of Simple Abundance A Daybook of Comfort and Joy.

After one of our global moves, some two decades ago, a culture shock in teaching awaited me and as a mother of two young girls, I put myself last in the line of caring. As you do. I needed to nurture myself and did so by starting firstly, a Gratitude Journal.

Nightly, I wrote 5 things for which I was grateful. Every new day, I was alert with awareness welcoming in anything and everything, no matter how mundane, that gave me pause or an "awe" moment. Not always did I recapture at bedtime the top 5 moments. Some days I was hard pressed to find even one. But it was enough to live each day being hopeful.

The second journal I commenced then was an Illustrated Discovery one. It was my scrapbook before scrapbooking became a new thing to do, of all things beautiful that touched my soul. In it I pasted images, scenes, quotations -- so when I flipped through its beauty laden pages it was like "hyacinths for the soul."

Some two decades later, I find myself on another healing journey, this time from anxiety. I still have my Illustrated Discovery Journal to gaze through all the beauty I recorded so long ago. Yet, now, it is the daily Gratitude that speaks more to my soul. I awake every new morning reciting mentally a list of things for which I am thankful. This list started off as meagre and almost forced, until today the thankfulness just flows. I take nothing for granted. I stop to smell the roses, or more the eucalypts here in Oz. I breathe in the fresh air of the bush. Listen to the varied songs of the birds. Gaze out at the vastness of water that surrounds me or the night time sky. Sit quietly with our cat snuggled on my lap. Smile. Greet my neighbour. Invite silence and being.

I end the day similarly by listing the things great and small for which I am grateful.

Gratitude is everywhere now. I happen upon articles on gratitude.
I attract books on gratitude. Rhonda Byrne suggests to "use gratitude until it becomes your way of life."
Gratitude is there in my daily meditation practice.
The Universe is forever sending me reminders to be grateful. I oblige.

It is this simple exercise that almost exclusively got me out of my fatalistic thinking with which anxiety plagued me this year.

Gratitude.
Happy Thanksgiving Day.

Published By: Valdone's Leaf
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

HEALING 2

The words often attributed to Buddha, but quoted as a Chinese and Zen Proverb as well. How true the words echo.

It wasn't until some six months later that my anxiety diminished and things just fell into place. Once my physical symptoms of depression were addressed, once sleep became regulated, once I could concentrate, once I started exercise, once I included acupuncture into my healing regime, once I made meditation, gratitude and affirmations a daily habit, once I introduced calming foods into my diet, once I was able to control my catastrophic thinking -- only then, was I able to apply anxiety management techniques. Only then, was I able to learn from my reading. Only then, was I able to control my anxiety.

The lesson for me was no matter how desperately I wanted to rid myself of this anxiety, I could not just will it away. And until my mind was ready, until the student was ready, I could not proceed with the next step, no teacher presented itself. No matter the good intention of anxiety programs like I mentioned in my last blog the Cool, Calm and Collected four week program, until the mind is ready, no amount of reading, wanting, daily lessons, and listening could penetrate the barriers put up because of my anxiety.

I am a firm believer now, that you just have to go through the anxiety. I hate to have to admit this since if I had read this during my searching, in the midst of my intense anxiety, I would have screamed and been acutely frustrated. So frustrated that there was nothing immediate that I could implement to rid me of the anxiety for good. Yes I came across sites that offered immediate relief for the anxiety symptoms. Sites such as Inner Health Studio gave advice, Psychology Today presented quick tips and the Calm Clinic presented guidance. And thank you for these and others. They were my saviour. All these helped me survive the intensity. My healing journey comprised surviving each minute, never mind anything more long-term.

For me the saying was aptly put: "When the student is ready, the teacher will appear."

To this day I still use the concepts I learned from the anxiety cure: Cool, Calm and Collected.  Not then, but six months later. My anxiety exited my life almost as insidiously as it entered it. For the most part. I still have the occasional day when the anxiety deigns to visit me and check in with me as if to challenge my learning strategies. This I can handle. But I no longer suffer 24/7. Thank you, my God.

Healing.

Published By: Valdone's Leaf

HEALING 1

My healing from anxiety took many forms.

At my lowest I tried anything. Everything. That is, whatever I was ready for at each given moment.

At first, I was surfing the Internet to find calming foods. There had to be foods that would give an instant feeling of calm? Right? After all there are foods that exacerbate the problem. Like coffee (or other forms of caffeine) which agitated me more than I was already. As much as I dislike Chamomile tea, every site spoke of its calming benefits. That became my drink of choice. The more anxious I was, the more Chamomile I downed.

Well it was during this researching that I came upon the site Calm Clinic. Reading what they had to say about diet, I was captured by and tempted by the blue print: "Take our 7 minute anxiety quiz." I was desperate. I needed a quick fix now! I wanted my anxiety to be over like yesterday. I no longer wanted neither the butterflies nor the panic attacks. I would have made a willing guinea pig for any sale's pitch, any experiment. So, yup! I caved. I clicked the blue print and did the test scoring a significantly high anxiety level. No surprise there. One thing led to another and before I knew it, I signed up for (and paid for it too!) a 4 week program: New Life With Cool, Calm and Collected.

The promise: you will be fully recovered if you ENGAGE in the program, TAKE the methods, DO the exercises, USE what you're going to learn. If you do all this, and I am always an eager student, "your panic attacks will VANISH, your anxiety and worry STOP and your confidence and self-esteem SOAR."

 I was sold! How could I not be pleased that this program would do this for me.

After 4 weeks nothing sunk in. Nothing. My mind was not ready, nor did it know how to register what I was learning. Actually, I was not learning. I simply listened, read and wrote. I wondered why following the program in its entirety, nothing changed. My anxiety still plagued me. Even more so. I kept resisting and the more I resisted, the deeper my anxiety went.

The caveat to this program, for me at any rate: you have to be ready. Emotionally. Mentally. Physically. Intellectually. Clearly nothing was working because NOTHING was working.

Healing.

Published By: Valdone's Leaf

WORDS I SAY

The principle of "neurons that fire together wire together" proposed by Freud, Hebb and Shatz has been the revolutionary brain science of the twentieth century. Also, the main teaching of my psychologist who was helping me overcome anxiety.

Being set some homework in between sessions about my especially anxious moments, I was to fill out a chart about what happened and the story I told myself. Upon retelling one scenario, I used the words: "I forced myself to go!" Said almost angrily. She picked up on this. Thus ensued my new lesson: when we pair a negative thought (in this case, word) with a highly charged negative emotion we make a neural pathway. What fires together, wires together.

Yes I just finished reading about this in The Brain That Changes Itself, but I could not connect the dots. I understood the concept with respect to science but clearly not when applied to my own life.

Now, I am more mindful of not only my thoughts but the words I say so emotively in my narratives and conversations. The words are more difficult as most of the time, I swear I speak as on automatic pilot. To fill the silence. Perchance why my daily affirmations have not been as effective as they could be?? I have enlisted the help of my husband to say something to me when I am pairing two negatives, as I am obviously unaware of doing so. The aim is to pair a positive thought or a positive word with a positive emotion. My affirmations now are accompanied by a smile.

The words I say.

"Man's word is his wand filled with magic and power." As penned by Florence Scovel Shinn.

The words I say.

"The words you speak become the house you live in." Hafiz

The words I say.

Published By: Valdone's Leaf

THOUGHTS I THINK

As my brain broke out of the worry loop of anxiety, I engaged in much reading. The common theme of all the books happened to be: the thoughts we think.

When I paused to examine my conscience (sounds like being in a confessional), my thoughts were negative. You can refer to my Blog on Negativity.  Unlike Rodin's The Thinker  who is poised in philosophical thought,

 

I was unbalanced in my thinking. Not only were my thoughts negative, they were defeatist. My thoughts were berating. My thoughts were sombre.

In Rhonda Byrne's The Secret, she writes "...as you think a thought, you are also attracting like thoughts to you."


Florence Scovel Shinn in The Game Of Life says that this said game "is a game of boomerangs. Man's thoughts, deeds and words return to him sooner or later, with astounding accuracy."

"Your mind is a tool you can choose to use any way you wish." Louise Hay shared this in her book You Can Heal Your Life.

I gleaned so many such golden nuggets. It wasn't until I recently read Evolve Your Brain and the science behind our thoughts, that I took mindful notice of how thoughts create who we are. Dr. Dispenza writes:

"Whether we like it or not, once a thought happens in the brain...All of the bodily reactions that occur from both our intentional or unintentional thinking unfold behind the scenes of our awareness."

GASP!

A couple of pages later he dropped this loaded statement: "What we repeatedly think about and where we focus our attention is what we neurologically become."

I now understand why I could not break free of my anxiety. Or why the symptoms just would not lessen. I kept feeding my brain more of the same worrisome thoughts day after day. And day after day, my anxiety strengthened. True to what the brain does. Even though my anxiety is not fully gone, on occasion choosing to visit, I know better now. The thoughts I think become me. As James Allen in As a Man Thinketh eloquently states in Chapter Two: "The world is your kaleidoscope, and the varying combinations of colours, which at every succeeding moment it presents to you are exquisitely adjusted pictures of your ever-moving thoughts."

Thoughts I think. I am ever so mindful of them.

Published By: Valdone's Leaf

MINDFULNESS

I touched upon the word "mindfulness" in my blog on Meditation. Here I will delve more deeply into what it is and how mindfulness has helped me with my anxiety.

Off and on in my life I dabbled with mindfulness, but never really applied it long-term. The picture of a Buddhist monk absorbed for hours on end in a serene composure of contemplative practice was what came to mind at the mention of mindfulness. When I was much younger than I am today, I used to interchange the words "mindfulness" and "meditation". I mean, after all, isn't this what I am trying to achieve during meditation practice - being mindful or aware of the something that I am doing?

True. But mindfulness is not linked only with meditation or monks. I became much more educated on what mindfulness is and the role it can play in my life once anxiety came to live with me. Strange, how one waits until one really needs help to introduce healing practices into our lives!

As you are aware from an earlier blog, one major symptom of anxiety is the inability to still the thoughts. At my worst, my thoughts were on a loop. Always fretful. Always worrying. And always negative. Going over and over and over in my mind. I would try anything to shut off this incessant prattle. Not only did I re-educate myself on meditation but on mindfulness as well. And this time I learned so much more throwing away my old beliefs of both.

Susan Baeur-Wu puts it simply -- mindfulness is "a way of being."

The Chinese character for the word "mindfulness" is made up of two parts: the upper part meaning "now; this"; the lower meaning "heart; mind."

Jon Kabat-Zinn comments that mindfulness is "coming to our senses."

Shauna Shapiro reiterates a monk's explanation to her, that "mindfulness is not just about paying attention, but also about how you pay attention."

Diana Winston of the UCLA Health System defines mindfulness as: "paying attention to present moment experiences with open curiosity and a willingness to be with what is."

Living life outside a cloister or monastery, all this shed some light on what I could do to be mindful. We have all experienced being out in nature and feeling in awe, totally calm and connected. This is mindfulness. We have all experienced being one with a hobby, activity, sport. This is mindfulness. But, I also learned to incorporate mindful awareness to daily life tasks that do not generally bring me to a moment of being absorbed with total quality. Still, it is not possible for me to be mindful about everything that I do, but daily I seize the moment and engage my senses in at least one activity, be it: walking or eating or showering or ironing or washing dishes. When I do this, I notice that I slow down and am really present appreciating everything and no longer viewing it as mundane or simply a chore to get it over with as quickly as is possible.

When I meditate, I keep endeavouring to be mindful. I welcome my thoughts, react compassionately and gently return to my meditation.

This practice over the last six weeks has stilled the chatter in my mind and when the monkeys come back on difficult days, I am able to manage them. It has been many weeks since I have been stuck in a loop. Being mindful has kept me in the present, escaping the past woes and the future concerns, both which are out of my control.

Mindfulness.

A stress-free place to be.

Published By: Valdone's Leaf

"SHOULD"

 

Today I am wearing my English teacher's hat providing a brief lesson on "should", originating from the Old English word for "sceolde".

Not seeing anything wrong with my choice of this word, I have been an habitual user of the word "should." "Should" was part of my vocabulary. Until my psychologist, whom I was seeing for anxiety, recommended replacing it.

This got me delving into my grammar books again. Bear with me.

"Should" is the past tense of "shall."

"Should" is one of the modal verbs in the English language. Along with "must," "ought," "might," "could," "would" and others. Modal verbs indicate a modality, a specific mode: giving permission, having the ability to, suggesting an obligation.

"Should" and "ought" hint at a moral obligation, thereby expressing a right or a wrong to your choice/decision.

Yikes!

When I examined my use of "should" more closely, I could see how the latter was so:

I should do this. But what if I really don't want to?
I should do that.  Will this be the correct choice?
I shouldn't do this or that. Because Gee! I might be punished.


For me, clearly, "should" implies guilt. ASIDE: Growing up a Catholic, "Guilt" became my middle name.

It is a word that keeps me in limbo -- you know, that in-between space betwixt heaven and hell. Neither here nor there in a matter of choice, in a decision.

One simple statement along my healing journey, put the onus on my already fragile mind of making a commitment. For example: "I should change my thought patterns." This could imply that if I do change them, then I am doing something right. But, if I don't change them -- I am doing something wrong. It is a statement that teeters. Not one that is built on a solid foundation. I see that now.

In therapy, likewise in positive affirmations, using the present tense is more effective as is a strong, positive and affirming declaration. So, according to my psychologist, instead of saying "I should..." declare "I choose to..." Instead of "I shouldn't...." rather "I choose not to...." This way, I could see that I am not only in control, but I would avoid moralizing providing the subconscious mind with a more empowering and decisive statement.

Now I catch myself and pause when the word "should" escapes from my unthinking mind and I quickly replace it with this more guilt-free option. An option that gives me the power of being, doing and acting.

Should.

Do you?

Published By: Valdone's Leaf