#I can´t write that into my book about overcoming the trauma of abuse and finding strength and family with the friends you make | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

rivkyschleider · 4 years

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Annotated Bibliography

Winnicott, D. (1986) Home is where we start from. England: London

In this collection of essays we learn of Winnicott’s key teachings, presented to a lay audience. He explains attachment theory, the ‘good enough environment’, the contribution of the Mother to society, adolescence and the relationship between the individual and their facilitating family group. He explores concepts of health versus illness through his lens as a psychoanalyst in addition to to his medical background. It is extremely helpful to see how foundation concepts of personality, the very make up of human emotional development can be applied to such a variety of cultural topics such as monarchy, the Pill and mathematics. He brings clarity to these issues and offers me a model for applying depth of insight about the subconscious and the effect of early childhood environment on later life. By uncovering gaps or repression in the individual’s psyche the psychotherapist can facilitate milestones of developmental progress, albeit at a later stage of maturation.

Yalom, I. (2002) The Gift of Therapy. US: HarperCollins

This is a handbook of 85 tips and instructions built upon 35 years of clinical practice and teaching. He paints a picture of a therapist in a way that inspires me to rise to the challenge of training and the ongoing character growth that is so crucial to this profession. He promotes curiosity, humility and transparency, and breaks away the the image of the therapist as an all-knowing provider of interpretations, or a blank canvas to absorb transference. He gives a practical guide for mining the here-and-now aspects of the therapeutic encounter to further the process of therapy. He describes tools for incorporating the therapist’s own feelings into the mix as well as how to explore dream material, how to take a history and how to look at their present; how their daily life is organised and peopled. He writes with deep pride on the privilege of helping others find meaning, health and joy.

Skynner, Cleese (1983) Families and how to Survive Them London: Vermilion

This was a a whistle-stop tour through all the major themes of child development, identity, attraction, relationships and family dynamics written as a conversation between Robin Skynner, a psychotherapist and John Cleese his former patient. They discuss the continuum that exists with optimally healthy families at one end; dysfunctional families with inter-generational problems at the other; and the “normal” families in the middle in which we see an expected mix of ‘screened off’ feelings alongside coping mechanisms, defenses and social norms to smooth the way. Skynner draws on Freudian ideas as well as later work by more recent therapists and analysts who looked at how families work as a system. Each part affects all other parts of the system. By considering inter-relationships through the eyes of a typical family we can learn about letting go of inherited mistakes and move forward to optimal family life.

Van Der Kolk, B. The Body Keeps the Score, United Stares: Penguin

This book is about how trauma impacts a person causing long term suffering to victims, their families and future generations. Using scientific methods such as brain scans and clinically sound investigations, Van Der Kolk looks at how the mind and body are transformed by traumatic events; how neural networks are formed as coping mechanisms and may later morph into unwanted behaviours. This is followed by a paradigm of treatment that seeks to give individual patients ownership of their narrative, their bodies and a route to self awareness and healing. Yoga, EMDR, neurofeedback and theater are offered as examples of pathways to recovery and I believe that art therapy is another good candidate for an embodied type of therapy, one that does not rely on talking alone. This book answered questions about my own pattern of mild symptoms and has opened up the whole field of mind/body connection in relation to trauma and healing.

Axline, V.M. (1964) Dibs In Search of Self. London: Penguin

Virginia M. Axline has written the true story of Dibs, her client; a talented and sensitive child who was trapped in isolation due to the lack of emotional connection in his life. Through psychotherapy - play therapy to be precise - he regained his sense of self and was eventually able to thrive, utilise his gifted nature and contribute to society. It is an eloquent case study obliquely laying out the principles of play and art therapy. The therapist built the safe environment in which the child could open up and slowly verbalise his deeply felt emotions. reparation with his parents blossoms. It is notable that the therapist made it safe for Dibs to express negativity. This teaches us to think about hostility as a sign sometimes of adequate ego strength for the feelings to be articulated. In that sense, aggression is a sign of health! This book is a beautiful testimony to the power of psychotherapy to transform lives.

Malchiodi, C. (2011) Trauma Informed Art Therapy and Sexual Abuse in Children. In: Goodyear-Brown, P. (ed.) Handbook of Child Sexual Abuse: Identification, Assessment and Treatment. United states: John Wiley & Sons

This chapter deals with how art therapy helps children who have suffered sexual abuse to articulate their sometimes unutterable experiences in a manner that the therapist can understand while within what is tolerable for the child. Trauma informed art therapy involves using art materials to address hyper-arousal and to teach relaxation, referencing the specific neuro circuit that is activated by hands on activities of a soothing nature. The sensory and tactile qualities of art materials need to be taken into consideration, how they are central to trauma recovery, but equally how they may trigger memories of distressful events. The somatic approach, using colour and shape enables children to locate the place in the body where trauma is held so they can learn to diminish distress. The author comments on the relevance of culturally sensitive materials and projects. This has been a rich article for me, linking my reading on trauma, with art therapy for a client group I may want to work with in the future.

Cane, F. (1951) The Artist in Each Of Us. United States: Art Therapy Publications

This book bridges art and therapy. It aims to give the reader a means to achieving a richer art and a more integrated life. It looks at how movement, feeling and thought work together. I was intrigued to read detailed technical instructions for accessing subconscious material which can be used to reach higher levels of artistic expression and also personal healing. The case studies record the progress of her students and how transcendence was coaxed up through fantasy, play, rhythmic movements, chanting and other indirect means until it could be released for union with the conscious. I tried out some of these techniques and was surprised to discover not only the catharsis, but also the unexpected outcomes of artwork spontaneously arising from my own psychological material. It shows me how the perceptive teacher can awaken in her students their own creativity and direct them to find solutions for subtle or complex inner dilemmas.

Dalley, T. (ed.) (1984) Art as Therapy. An Introduction to the use of art as a therapeutic technique. London: Routledge

This book is an introduction to the theories that underpin art therapy and is broad in it’s range of contributing authors. We get an outline of the role of art within a therapeutic framework, the manifestation of art as play, as a language of symbols and development. The historical links between art education and art therapy are explored; the differences and what they have in common; and a possibility for merging the two fields. Each chapter on a specific client group offers insights for working with these vulnerable people in a way that will give direct therapeutic benefit.

I found the chapter on art therapy in prisons to be particularly enlightening. The author was clear about the actual constraints of working in that environment, what the pitfalls might be and she presented practical guidance on overcoming them. She promotes a vision for how arts can transform the most ant-social of prisoners into creative, productive people; this raises pertinent questions for the current justice system.

Price, J. (1988) Motherhood, What it Does to Your Mind London: Pandora Press

A fascinating book delving into the psychology of mothering written by a female psychiatrist and psychotherapist. It ties up the concepts of attachment theory with the realities of modern relationships and societal expectations. It is presented through the lens of a Woman, a woman who lived through her own mother-daughter dynamic, pregnancy, giving birth, breast feeding and the like. She looks at how our culture and family story play out in our own lives whether consciously or unconsciously. By normalising much of the natural difficulties of mothering, this book can offer solace in trying times.

I am a mother of four boys and pregnant with my fifth child, so I am justified to claim that his book ought to become mainstream knowledge. It is through lived experiences that we can most genuinely form opinions and then reach out to help others in a professional capacity.

Case, C. Dalley, T. (1992) The Handbook of Art Therapy London: Routledge

This handbook is a bird’s eye view of the profession. It covers the theories of psychoanalysis and how it intersects with art as well as a detailed look at the practical aspects of employment as an art therapist in jargon-free language. This gives a beginner art therapist a survival guide for those inevitable first forays into work. I gained a grasp on the complexities surrounding room set-up or lack of appropriate dedicated space. A how-to guide on various forms of note taking making use of the same example session throughout the different formats was extremely helpful. There is clear preparation for supervision, referrals, working in an institution, operating as part of a team versus being isolated and potentially being misunderstood. Reading this was an important step towards becoming a competent practitioner.

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bettsfic · 6 years

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Hey so like...how do u justify romanticising a minor/adult relationship bc as a minor it kinda makes me uncomfortable. You’re an amazing writer, I just don’t quite get why you chose the age gap

before i address your question directly, and i will, i want to point out a few things that confuse me about this ask.

first, the admission of being a minor with the implication you’ve read my work, and now outright interacting with me. i’ve written maybe half a dozen g- and t-rated fics, and none of them are particularly popular, which i’m guessing means you’ve read my explicit fics, which means you’ve clicked past Ao3′s polite “18+ only” warning. my apologies if this assumption is incorrect – maybe you really have only read my three or four gen/teen-rated fics. that just seems very unlikely to me because all of my more popular fics are mature and explicit.

now, while admitting you are a minor made uncomfortable by minor/adult relationships, you have directly approached me, a 29 year old woman, to ask me why i’ve made the choices i’ve made. granted, by going on anon, you’ve ensured that this is a public forum, but if you’d PM’d me, i wouldn’t have responded, because i am not here to interact with minors.

which brings me to my conclusion of this portion of the ask, which is: i am not writing for minors and i do not want to interact with minors. i can’t control what you read or don’t read and it’s absolutely not my responsibility to cater to you in any way, especially if you knowingly and voluntarily click past the 18+ warning. but i can control my personal interactions, and i urge you not to reach out to me again.

next i’m going to nitpick the word “romanticize” which is a word heavy in the current moral rhetoric. literally speaking, you are right. i am making an age gap romance romantic. rhetorically speaking, to “romanticize” something means to flatten or gloss over it, sweep potential consequences under the rug. to romanticize abuse, for example, is to make it beautiful, to ignore all the trauma and pain that comes along with it. (i think it is a worthy artistic endeavor to attempt to romanticize abuse in fiction, if for only the ability to highlight how fucked up abusive relationships can feel in the moment, but that’s a rant for another time).

since you haven’t read training wheels, i can tell you outright i am not romanticizing a minor/adult relationship. there are certainly unrealistic/porny moments, but i’m not shying away from the actual emotional consequences of being a 17yo* girl dating a 25yo man. i’m doing my best to depict this relationship the way these relationships are actually felt, because they do happen, and i have been in them. they can be very romantic, but that doesn’t mean i’m romanticizing them. though we’re not in his pov, bellamy is acutely aware of the greater context of their relationship. and clarke, who has no context, is doing her best to navigate the difficulty of her situation, semi-aware that it’s something that will be haunting her for a long, long time.

i am not beautifying the ugliness of their relationship; i am not fetishizing (another word i take issue with) the minor body. being in clarke’s pov means that bellamy is object of desire, and meanwhile we get, through clarke’s thoughts, the sometimes awkward and confusing realization of what it means to be wanted, loved, used, seen, broken, trespassed, and all the other things teenage girls sometimes have to navigate.

and i have one more thing to say before i answer your actual question: you are allowed to be uncomfortable reading fiction. in fact, i think you should be uncomfortable reading fiction. all art should make us uncomfortable, because in discomfort lies broader awareness. by consuming things which push at the boundaries of our narrow reality, we are capable of widening that reality, and that’s what it means to learn and grow and become the people we want to be. you cannot become a better, stronger, wiser person without facing and overcoming that which makes you uncomfortable.

i also resent a bit the implication that i, a fanfic writer, a queer woman, am beholden to appeasing your comfort when straight white male writers are not. i assume you’re not sending jroth letters about how murphy’s sex slavery arc in s3 made you uncomfortable. or that the entire premise of the show revolves around putting a hundred minors in a ship and dropping them onto a potentially lethal planet. or raven, a teenager, sleeping with bellamy, an adult, in s1. and that’s not even mentioning the violence perpetuated against minors in the show. they die! and they bleed! like, a lot!! charlotte, a 12yo girl, dies a gruesome death in s1. they are minors forced to kill or be killed in exceedingly violent ways, and you’re in my inbox asking why i’m writing a fic that depicts a loving and consensual relationship between a 17yo (clarke’s canonical age in s1) and a 25yo.

now i’ll answer your actual ask.

you use the word “justify” as if i had to do some kind of logistical puzzle to make this fic morally okay in my eyes. i can tell you now, i did not, because the story exists to navigate that logistical puzzle on its own. the conflict poses the question: is this okay? is this wrong? what about it is wrong? for what reasons is it wrong? and i also attempt (in a clunky way because it’s a bit rough, plot-wise) to navigate what “informed consent” really means to a 17yo who has no information to go off of. for me it’s an experiment in what consent really is. clarke wants bellamy, but she doesn’t have a full awareness of the consequences of that want, so is it truly consensual? what does bellamy have to do to fully inform her of those consequences? is it even his responsibility, or should clarke take more agency over her experiences? and lastly, the most interesting question of them all to me – what happens to the minors in consensual age gap relationships? how do they cope with that experience years later? in what ways does it change them?

though it’s not my responsibility to indulge my personal ties to this conflict in order to further “justify” it, i can assure you, i am writing this from clarke’s pov having been the younger party in many age gap relationships, at times a minor. at times coerced. at times completely uninformed. but each time, consensual. i sought out the men i dated. i took the lead. i propositioned them. and i consider: how has that affected me and the way i love now?

my mom at 20, married my dad, 32. my older sister at 16, met her (now ex) husband, her then-boss, at 23 (they waited until she was 18 to start dating). i dated an 18yo and then a 19yo when i was 14. a 21yo when i was 16. a 32yo when i was 19. a 47yo when i was 22. but i also had a long-term relationship with someone who was just three months younger than me. age gap is not the only way i know how to love, but it is certainly a way to love, and one i find, in lieu of seeking it out in reality, narratively compelling. so i write about those experiences in order to better understand them now that i’m older. in order to take them apart and piece them back together. in order to, in some cases, relive them, because i enjoyed so much about them.

i don’t pursue older men anymore because i no longer seek male validation. i don’t meet a handsome middle-aged man and need him to love me to feel like my existence in the world is warranted. but that doesn’t mitigate all the old habits and drive and potentially genetic disposition that led me to relentlessly pursuing them in the first place. so now i sublimate that into fiction and offer my experience and understanding to others who might be predisposed in the same way, or people who are not and curious about what that experience is like. and that’s what fiction does.

lastly, i’ve sort of saturated myself in age gap stories. i’ve watched every age gap movie i can get my hands on, read every book. i dive through google and ao3 looking for age gap recs, seeking out the one story or fic or movie that not only gets the relationship right, but figures out how to make it work. that’s all i want – a realistic, plausible solution to this very delicate and complicated kind of relationship. and i can’t find that story, so i’ve decided to write it myself.

training wheels is an uncomfortable story about a romantic minor/adult relationship and the realistic psychological consequences of it, both in the immediate present and long-term, and you are supposed to be made uncomfortable by it, regardless of your age. it makes romantic but does not romanticize age gap relationships. i do not take the morality of this story lightly, nor its meaning or intentions. whether i succeed in this is up to interpretation, and i can’t control that interpretation, but i can tell you with certainty what my intentions have been going into this story, and exactly why i’ve made the decisions i’ve made regarding it.

*the age of consent in ohio, where training wheels is set, is 16. i recognize the current rhetoric around this is “legality is not morality” or whatever, but again – the purpose of training wheels is in part to directly address this conflict

#training wheels #crybaby verse #discourse #tsatp #Anonymous

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evelynjhendrix · 4 years

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TRIAL TAPPERS to be released on March 31, 2020

Hugh D. Watt self-published book, TRIAL TAPPERS - Tapping Life's Trials to Produce Positive Growth, is set for release on March 31, 2020.

Hugh decided to write this self-help book after his younger brother decided to commit suicide and he came face-to-face with the man who sexually abused him as a child during the funeral service. As a licensed clinician, he has unique insight into the worst trials and traumas people experience in life. He simplifies learning in a way that has allowed him to successfully help others to understand that trials and trauma in life can produce growth.

The book, which provides its readers with 12 Tools to Survive Trials from Health, Finance, Traumas, Sex Abuse to Suicide, will be available on different platforms on Amazon including e-book, paperback, and audio book. The first book in the TRIAL TAPPER series has already reached #1 for new releases in the categories of Crisis Management Counseling, Mood Disorders, and Christian Ministry to Sick & Bereaved.

Self help book

The self help book for men, women and teens is meant for anyone who is struggling under the weight of challenges in life. It is a guide to finding hope and creating lasting change. The post traumatic growth guidebook uses immersive approach to teach important lessons which can help an individual move from victimhood to confidence and peace. “Whether your trials stem from abuse, addiction, finances, mental or physical health, the tools in this book can see you through them and help you move forward,” said the author while detailing the content of the book.

Hugh’s aim of writing the book is to help others understand that trials and trauma in life can produce growth. As a person who has unique insights into worst trials and traumas that people experience in life both as a practicing clinician and as a person whose own brother decided to commit suicide, he has simplified learning in such a way that people who are facing grief can understand and relate to. The book aims at giving tools in the form of visual stories with questions which can help in suicide prevention as well as overcoming trials from health and finance issues.

Reviews

“Everyone can benefit from this rare display of openness, and the life lessons learned along the way.” Brad Anderson, Co-founder Covey Leadership Center. Author: The View from Under My Desk–My Battle with Depression in the Workplace in his review of the book.

Mark J. Maggio, Ph.D. Chairman of the Board, Emeritus International Critical Incident Stress Foundation recommended the book, saying that the writer has taken us on a journey from the perspective not only of a practitioner but also as a survivor. “For those who are searching for renewal after the trauma, Trial Tappers is a must read,” he added.

Walter T. Simon, Ph.D. President- Progressive Therapy Systems says the book has been helpful. “I found this book helpful because it puts in simple words what are complex and difficult experiences. Now, I can start thinking about my experiences in a meaningful way, take action, take charge, and feel much more in control of my life,” said Walter.

About the author

Hugh D. Wattis a licensed clinical social worker with more than twenty years of experience. He has earned a Master’s Degree in Social Work from University of Denver. Hugh uses his personal experience to demonstrate that resilience is possible after any trial. Having worked with both teens and adults, experiencing variety of personal trials and tribulations he clearly understands how such incidences can disrupt life and how one can move away from pain towards hope.

Media Contact

Hugh D. Watt, MSW, LCSW, Author

801-651-1872

http://www.trialtappers.com/ (Soon)

[email protected]

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integrativeaddiction · 5 years

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Addiction Treatment A Strengths Perspective

Contents

Harm reduction approach

Perspective. 2. introduce … assessing

Parent perspective … joe realized

Strengths perspective. [katherine

Perspective 2nd ed. katherine van wormer

Addiction Treatment: A Strengths Perspective. Uploaded by Katherine van Wormer. flyer for 4th ed., co-authored with Diane R. Davis uses a harm reduction approach and bridges the gap with a 12-Step Approach. Copyright: © All Rights Reserved. Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd.

addictions is approached from both a clinical and policy perspective. 2. introduce … assessing client's strengths. ….. Addiction treatment: A strengths perspective.

Addiction Treatment: A strengths perspective. Thomson/Brooks/Cole. Cayce Watson, MSSW, LAPSW, is a Licensed Advanced Practice Social Worker and has …

May 1, 2012 … In effect, the strengths perspective is the social work equivalent of … care) or impede treatment (eg non-adherence to medication) (Badenoch, 2006). …. of fields such as substance abuse, mental health, school counselling, …

dual diagnosis strengths perspective substance abuse … Dual Diagnosis: Evaluation, Treatment, Training and Program Development, New York: Plenum …

Health officials, police chiefs, employers, welfare workers, and politicians at all levels of government are desperately calling for more effective drug treatment … perspective is that it undervalue…

I describe this thinking distortion in Addiction Treatment: A Strengths Perspective as either/or reasoning– “either you are with us or against us.” Oddly, Bush used those very words in his dealings wi…

Addiction Treatment: A Strengths Perspective is intended for use as a primary text in courses related to substance misuse or as a secondary text in courses, graduate or undergraduate, related to health, social work, mental health, offender rehabilitation, and family counseling.

Nov 22, 2016 … In this video, Carol Hopkins share what has happened with a treatment programme for First Nations youth struggling with solvent addiction, and …

Addiction Treatment: A Strengths Perspective. By Katherine van Vormer and Diane Rae Davis. Thomson Brooks/Cole, Pacific Grove, CA, USA.

ADDICTION TREATMENT covers the biological, psychological, and social aspects of alcoholism, eating disorders, compulsive gambling, and other addictions. Katherine S. Van Wormer and Diane Rae Davis. Addiction Treatment: A Strengths Perspective.

based practice in the field of substance abuse treatment. The course …. Van Wormer, K., & Davis D.R. (2013) Addiction Treatment: A Strengths Perspective 3rd.

Fletcher visited 15 addiction-treatment programs, from the high-end to the bare … down with recommendations and referrals get pretty tedious — the information and perspective Fletcher provides are …

In addition to ADDICTION TREATMENT: A STRENGTHS PERSPECTIVE, she has recently published SOCIAL WELFARE POLICY FOR A SUSTAINABLE FUTURE, THE MAID NARRATIVES and numerous other books, including two on female offenders and victims and one on the nature of…

The Tampa discussion about the strengths perspective mirrored …. Enhancing substance abuse treatment with case management: Its impact on employment.

Clients have a right to humane care and treatment. They also have a right … pastoral counseling, addiction counseling, bodywork, and medical practice, should always be oriented to your emotional …

To put that number into perspective … addiction are serious, they can be reversed with effective and persistent action. If you or a loved one is experiencing signs of substance abuse, consult your d…

Lauren, an adoptee herself, writes poignantly about adoption trauma from both the child and parent perspective … joe realized how broken our current system is for addiction and related mental health …

The Addiction Solutions Campaign recently … but sustainable solutions must consider a local community’s strengths and weaknesses. This community inventory would include a list of all local preventio…

Strengths and limitations of this study. This is the first ….. Sensky T , et al . Treatment goals in addiction healthcare: the perspectives of patients and clinicians.

It provides a forum and community for Christian’s dealing with addiction, compulsion, co-dependency, alcoholism and other problems to share their experience, strength and hope … Pain from God’s Pers…

Addiction treatment : a strengths perspective. [katherine S Van Wormer; Diane Rae Davis] — "This text is grounded in the empowerment perspective and the harm reduction approach. Emphasis is on the biology of addiction, but there are also sections on the psychological and social components …

Addiction Treatment: A Strengths Perspective. 258,93 руб. 1. The Nature of Addiction. 2. Historical Perspectives. 3. Strengths-Based Helping Strategies. Part II. The biology of addiction.

"The urge to stop has been there for two to three years in treatment," he says … stories of working to overcome pornography addiction and porn-inducted erectile dysfunction, both as a way to gain st…

Each approach to drug treatment is designed to address certain aspects of drug addiction and its consequences for the individual, family, and society.

President Trump officially made opioid addiction a public health emergency … looking for a new way to manage her pain. Her treatment hadn’t been patient-centered, meaning focused on her needs and he…

That’s why some experts see hope in a drug treatment program that addresses not only the addiction, but its causes as well … Chavez felt proud in that moment of strength. But he was immediately remi…

Heroin led to more than 8,000 overdose deaths in 2013 alone; rates of heroin addiction have quadrupled in just over a decade. A Historical Perspective on Opioids … expand access to effective treatme…

She brought a fresh perspective to the Bellevue City Council, where she got involved in international trade, resource management, transportation and youth, before moving on to the state Legislature.” …

Keywords: Strengths, strengths-based practice, intervention, motivation, motivational interviewing …… Addiction treatment: A strengths perspective. (2nd ed.).

Addiction Treatment: A Strengths perspective 2nd ed. katherine van wormer Diane Rae Davis. Introduction. • Addiction affects us all. • Strengths perspective—strengths of clients & strengths of the models: – harm reduction – 12 Step approach. • Rift in field. • Book in 3 parts: bio-psycho-social.

Addiction Treatment: A Strengths Perspective. Katherine van Wormer, Diane Rae Davis. ADDICTION TREATMENT covers the biological, psychological, and social aspects of alcoholism,eating disorders, compulsive gambling, and other addictions.

View 9780840029164_TB_Ch1 from SXF 400 at Florida Institute of Technology. TEST BANK ADDICTION TREATMENT: A STRENGTHS PERSPECTIVE 3rd …

addiction treatment Summary and conclusion. Mutual-help groups : a strengths perspective Introduction Alcoholics Anonymous Gamblers Anonymous Other twelve-step groups Other mutual-support groups Recovery community centers How to support client involvement in mutual-help groups…

Dec 11, 2014 … The Strengths Perspective in Social. Work Practice. ▫ Katherine van Wormer & Diane Rae. Davis (2003). Addiction Treatment: A Strengths.

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McAneney, an oncologist practicing in Albuquerque, makes these visit all over the country, comparing strengths of local … Robert Yakely. More addiction specialists are needed in the state, along wit…

From my perspective, the article overstates the diversion problem. In my last post I asked if the fear of diversion should be a factor in whether buprenorphine-based medications become the leading edg…

Addiction Treatment A Strengths Perspective SW 393R 23 Treatment of Chemical Dependency.

Start by marking "Addiction Treatment: A Strengths Perspective" as Want to Read ADDICTION TREATMENT covers the biological, psychological, and social aspects of alcoholism, eating disorders, compulsive gambling, and other addictions.

Addiction treatment. K Van Wormer … Social work with lesbians, gays, and bisexuals: A strengths perspective … Alcoholism treatment: A social work perspective.

Feb 24, 2010 … perspective, the strengths perspective, and the harm reduction … worker substance abuse treatment provider counterparts, including use of.

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edc-creations-blog · 5 years

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Are people constantly dumping their negative energy on you? Do you find yourself bombarded with painful thoughts from your past? What if with seven simple steps you could minimize their mess and maximize your happiness? Interested? Read on…

In Family Is Not Everything: How To Minimize Their Mess, Maximize Your Happiness and Enjoy Emotional Baggage Breakthroughs, author Anita Washington details personal stories of surviving a homicidal alcoholic father, a neglectful mother and an emotionally and physically abusive brother to show you how childhood trauma turns into adult dysfunctional behavior. She includes lessons to learn from her abuse and her life-altering mistakes, along with teaching you how to use the affirmations, techniques and activities of her 7-Step Method to resolve the effects of emotional baggage and create a life of purpose and meaning. The 7-Step Method is a process of seven sequential steps she had seen produce the greatest results. It has not only worked for her and her previous clients, it can also work for you!

BOOK REVIEWS

ASwirlGirl 5.0 out of 5 stars This Book is Riveting! I finished this book a few days ago and I’m still mulling over what I’ve read. So much of Family Is Not Everything is heartbreaking and painful to read, and my heart ached for Anita. I rejoice in the fact that despite EVERYTHING that happened in her childhood and young adult-hood, Anita TRIUMPHED. She shares realistic, actionable steps that can be taken by others who feel trapped by their past or the circumstances of life. I applaud Anita’s courage and transparency in writing this book. I’ve been impacted profoundly as a result of reading this, and I know I’ll be thinking about what I’ve read for years to come.

Falexia 5.0 out of 5 stars A must read! Amazing book, hard to put down. It’s heartbreaking to read about the horrible things Anita endured, but despite what she went through she didn’t let it destroy her. This book is for everyone who grew up in a dysfunctional family, it gives you hope and inspired you to use what you’ve gone through to help others. We are taught that family is everything, yet the Word even says that your enemies will be members of your own household, Matt 10:36, therefore family is not everything and it’s okay to cut them off if it means saving your life. The book helps you under generational curses and educated you on how to be an overcome and not stay a victim. This book is going to help a lot of people who want to be free from the prison of their past, it gives hope for those who grew up in a negative or toxic environment. Freedom can be yours if you put into actions the steps Anita lays out in this book.

Sharon Lawrence, LCSW-C 5.0 out of 5 stars Brave, Resilient, and Courageous!! This book is amazing!!! It speaks for many who are afraid to share their stories of pain and trauma. Anita takes us on a journey while providing us with tools to improve our own lives with no guilt. It will teach you how to establish self-respect, set boundaries and live a free life. Thank you Anita!!!

Rhonda Dickerson 5.0 out of 5 stars Family is Not Everything!!! This book is sooo good. It is very hard to put down. After reading this book it gave me a extra push to finish my book and not worry about others opinion. I am so happy for you Anita. Thank you for allowing God to use you to help and health others. Love you!!

Charlie Latham 5.0 out of 5 stars A helpful book that gives you actionable steps to work on Everyone has traumatic events happen in their childhood and this is what shapes and molds our psychological behavior and outlook. Ultimately we all have traits we don’t like because of this, and they vary in so many ways depending on what exactly we’ve been through. For me I mainly struggle with a mixture of anxiety and emotional detachment which grew from going to boarding school at a young age. Reading this helped me analyse why I had these personality traits, dissect that a bit and deal with it. It showed me how these had formed and gave me steps that I can actively follow to change this way of thinking and behaving.

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Excerpt: Family Is Not Everything: How To Minimize Their Mess, Maximize Your Happiness and Enjoy Emotional Baggage Breakthroughs

BACK IN THE DAY

Once upon a time, we managed emotional problems with only prayer and encouragement. Seeking professional help was frowned upon. We were taught, What happens in this house, stays in this house. Seeking counseling services for divorce or molestation or addiction or domestic violence was taboo. Society expected the wife being battered by her husband to stay married, the niece being molested by an uncle to keep quiet, the daughter with the alcoholic father to make the best of it. Divorce wasn’t even regarded as a serious consideration. Instead, any spouse considering divorce was encouraged to make a new commitment to their vows, to pray, and to have faith. We were expected to achieve emotional wellness through a process of suppression and turning a blind eye. Adults had to live their lives according to who they were expected to be and hide who they really were. Children were expected to be seen and not heard.

Remember those days?

The unspoken belief was that when the person died, the problem died with them. When the alcoholic father died, the problems and effects of alcoholism died with him. When the physically abusive mother died, the problems and effects of battery died with her. Unfortunately, nothing could be further from the truth and, because of this, generational curses have been present in our society for centuries. A generational curse is created when the effects of an emotional offense are passed down from one generation to another. It manifests through different dysfunctional behaviors in each family member but can be traced back to one common cause. So how is a generational curse passed down? In emotional baggage.

Children who grow up in dysfunctional environments become adults who exhibit dysfunctional behavior. A child learns from their experiences and from what they’re exposed to and then utilizes that later—albeit unknowingly—as a mechanism when they become an adult. In large part, the person you are today is a collection of your past experiences. Your behavior is shaped by what you think, and what you think is determined by what you’ve seen and heard. Basically, traumatic events experienced during childhood and left unresolved produce dysfunctional behavior in the adult. We carry it around unseen in the form of emotional baggage. Don’t believe me? Keep reading. Let me put it in live and living color for you.

THE STORY – THREE GENERATIONS

Imagine a family of three generations: a grandmother, mother, and daughter. Although the grandmother dies a couple years after the granddaughter is born, somehow, at the tender age of sixteen, they will each have become teenage mothers.

The year is 2000. In a small town in the southeastern United States, the high school football team is playing in the state championship game. The entire town is excited. Flat-panel TVs are mounted over the counters of local hotels and fast-food restaurants. Policemen direct the heavy traffic with glow-in-the-dark mascot paw prints painted on the palms of their gloves. Young and old, those with children and those without gather in the local stadium to watch the beloved home team take on their fifty-year rival. The bleachers rock from the beat of the fight songs played by the high school band as the crowd claps and dances along with the cheerleaders. The art club paints paw prints and jersey numbers on the faces of fans of every age. The booster club sells hot dogs, hamburgers, French fries, and popcorn decorated in the team’s colors. The junior class volunteers sell commemorative programs and T-shirts to raise money for their impending senior trip. It’s the second quarter and the score is 14–7, with the home team in the lead.

While love, happiness, and excitement roar over the bleachers, under the bleachers lives lust and desire. Justin, affectionately called “the Magic Two” by other students, is the son of an alcoholic and the lead-scoring shooting guard for the high school basketball team. He stands six-four, is clean-cut and caramel colored, with hazel eyes. He has set his eyes on Monisha, a 4.0, coke-bottle-curved yet unpopular geek sophomore who has just celebrated her sixteenth birthday—and who is very conflicted. In her head she keeps hearing the one thing her mother has repeated her entire life: “Leave boys alone. They’ll ruin your life.” But inside she feels the butterflies flutter as Justin says, “You’re really beautiful,” and wraps his letterman’s jacket around her shoulders.

When Monisha was born in 1984, her mother, Monique, was sixteen, and her father, Clayton, was seventeen. They were the head cheerleader and captain of the football team, and everyone adored them. Wherever you saw her, you saw him and his cherry-red Ford Escort. Monique had thick, jet-black, shoulder-length hair and a tiny waist. Clayton had a bright, big, money-grip smile that sparkled with all the promises of possibility for future success. The night of the junior prom, Monique wore a floor-length Carolina Herrera sheath-silhouette evening gown with a twist one-shoulder strap. Clayton was in a black-and-white tuxedo. He picked Monique up at her home at seven o’clock Friday night and dropped her off at noon on Saturday; with that, Monisha was conceived. The generational curse had claimed another member of the family. The emotional baggage of hurt and shame had shut down healthy communication about love, sex, or relationships in Monique’s household. Monique too had been the product of a teen pregnancy, a disappointment to not only family but also the community, which was harbored by Millie, Monique’s mother, in silence.

Millie threw herself into making life look perfect and good, even though she was hurting on the inside. That silence left Monique to learn responsible behavior by trial and error. Millie was too hurt to bring it up for discussion and too ashamed to acknowledge the right way because it would shed light on the fact that she’d done it the wrong way. Millie and Sam, Monique’s father, were one of the more well-respected and affluent couples in town, the kind that keeps family faux pas quiet.

In 1968, Millie and Sam were the pride of the local Section 8 project community. A straight-A student, Millie excelled in math and science. Monique’s father, Sam, was the lead singer in a quartet, crooning Motown jams at parties every Saturday night and belting out soul-stirring gospel hymns in the churches every Sunday morning.

Millie and Sam managed to make marriage look good. Millie attended teachers’ college and secured a position teaching math at the elementary school. Sam traveled the world extensively, first as a lead singer, then as a solo artist. It was his way of handling his feelings of hurt and shame from teenage pregnancy, creating a family he was not able to provide for. If he didn’t see it, he didn’t have to face it.

The music hits and the steady paychecks were ever present in Monique’s home, but attention and love were not. Her parents provided food, clothing, and shelter but otherwise ignored Monique. She was the evidence of their failure to live a moral life. If they did not look at her, they didn’t have to wear the badge of embarrassment. Rumors of Sam’s cheating on the road would sometimes filter back to town, but proof didn’t materialize until the other wife and children attended his funeral. Neither Millie nor Sam was emotionally present or available to cultivate genuine love in their child. Unconsciously, her parents passed on the emotional baggage of hurt and shame and, though she was always the best-dressed girl in school, the baton of the family curse seamlessly moved from one generation to another and now another.

Monisha, the third generation, has her mother’s curves and her grandfather’s soulful songbird voice. Her grandmother, Millie, raised her until her untimely death when Monisha was three years old. At that time, Monisha went to live with her mother, Monique, who rarely smiled because, like Monique was to Millie, Monisha was the evidence of the life-altering mistake Monique had made. It had crushed her dreams of attending college and going to law school. She was stuck in a small town working swing shifts at a dead-end hourly job in the local food factory. Her conversations were full of pessimistic snappy comebacks uttered between the cigarettes she chain-smoked. Unfortunately, because of the emotional baggage she carried, she couldn’t free herself of the hurt and disappointment so she could mature and be a better mother to Monisha than Millie had been to her. When Monisha entered high school and the house phone started ringing with boys calling, Monique simply hung up the phone and told Monisha, “Leave boys alone, they’ll ruin your life.” Throughout Monisha’s childhood she heard her mother’s grumblings about how her father was no good. Monique complained constantly about how Clayton didn’t buy food or how he was not trustworthy enough to babysit.

The educational trend of social promotion of star athletes made it very difficult for Clayton to survive at the Ivy League college that heavily recruited him. Though he had a 3.7 GPA, it was obvious Clayton could read and write at only a fourth-grade level, so he dropped out. Out of compassion, the community business owners, who were once high school teammates of Clayton’s, employed him for odd jobs until his addiction to alcohol would take over his performance and he would return to rehab to dry out once again. He was of no assistance to Monique.

Teen pregnancy is the epidemic, lack of communication and courage to heal are its enablers, but hurt and shame are the generational curse. And so, two weeks after her sixteenth birthday and just twenty minutes after belting out a soulful rendition of the National Anthem, Monisha is under the bleachers at the state championship football game. She thinks she knows what love is. She believes Justin is the one to give her that forever-after kind of love. Justin has taken her from nerd-weird to crazy-cool with one wink of his eye and made her the most popular girl in school—that’s love, or so Monisha feels.

Our biggest problem as a society is that the emotional baggage of hurt, pain, guilt, and shame gets passed down but not resolved. It can live in a family for centuries yet never be discussed openly. Why? Some believe discussing it openly glorifies it. Others believe if it is not discussed, it will go away. These misconceptions breed life into the problem and death to the soul. It forces victims to continue to suffer in silence. It creates a breeding ground for dysfunctional behavior that can hurt future generations.

You’ve seen it a hundred times. The daughter of a teen mom grows up to have a baby at the exact same age her mom birthed her. The son of a heroin addict grows up to be addicted to heroin. The son of a physically abusive father grows up to physically assault his wife. The daughter of a battered and beaten mom grows up to only feel she is loved—when? When she’s being hit. The string of connected dots from one generation to another is a generational curse. But hold on—please do not think the “dots” are always the same kind of dysfunctional behavior.

The pattern of maladaptive behavior can manifest differently in each person. For instance, a father beaten and sodomized in the sixties commits suicide. His son, who was a teen at the time of the incident, becomes a substance abuser. And his son, the third generation, for lack of having a healthy father, becomes a womanizer. Suicide, substance abuse, and womanizing are all dysfunctional behaviors that can be traced back to the experience the family suffered in the sixties. All the behaviors—suicide, substance abuse, and womanizing—are dysfunctional behaviors but not the same behavior. Get it? Maybe this will help …

Imagine three generations of men—a grandfather and his brother, son, and grandson—exhibiting different coping mechanisms but carrying emotional baggage because of the same horrific historic incident.

The year was 1972. MLK Jr. and JFK had been assassinated. On every wall in America hung honors in their memory as the fight for civil rights raged on. Jim and his brother Peter were leaving a protest in Atlanta, Georgia, driving back to Charleston, South Carolina, when they stopped at a country corner store for gas. The sign in the window read “Always Open, All Welcome,” but the rifle pushing into Jim’s back as he paid for the gas Peter had just pumped said “White’s only.” Peter was forced behind the store at gunpoint with his hands up in the “don’t shoot” position. After the pillowcase went over Jim’s head, he began reciting the “Our Father” prayer. He thought about his darling wife, his aging mother, and the murders of Mr. Evers and Dr. King. Jim could hear Peter screaming as he was dragged behind the store. Both men were sodomized, severely beaten, and left for dead. Both men were found by a white college professor returning from a summit in Charleston, South Carolina, to his home in Atlanta when he stopped for gas around midnight and oddly found the store closed.

Jim and Peter were taken to a hospital. When they returned home, they were physically healed but emotionally destroyed. Jim sat for days without uttering a word. His wife continued to love and care for him until his death in 1983, just shy of his son Jeremiah’s sixteenth birthday.

Jeremiah doesn’t remember his father’s happy-go-lucky personality. He remembers only a lump of human existence that sat on the porch from sunup to sundown, and then at the dinner table until bedtime. Because she worked as a housekeeper at the local college, Jeremiah’s mother was gone all day, but Jeremiah’s Uncle Peter would stop by the house to see his brother, Jim. Somehow, Peter seemed to have bounced back to a normal life—always full of jokes for Jim and candy for Jeremiah. On one particular day, Peter didn’t stay on the porch with Jim. He softly walked the house and found it empty, with the exception of Jeremiah, napping in his bedroom. Sitting on the porch, Jim cried as he listened to his son scream for Uncle Peter to stop hurting him, but Jim never moved. Two years later, Jim drove to a nearby pond, locked all the doors on his 1957 Chevy pickup truck, set it ablaze, and burned to death.

Jeremiah’s high school friends affectionately called him Jerry. They loved his happy-go-lucky demeanor and warm smile. When they cut class to hang out at the baseball field, he always supplied the booze. Jerry started drinking heavily at fifteen—the same year he fell in love with Susan, the beautiful sixteen-year-old platinum blond with the baby-blue eyes. Together, they smoked, drank, and made love. The next year, they had Justin, a beautiful baby boy with hazel eyes. Jerry and Susan remained a couple. Though Susan worked full-time as a receptionist, Jerry bounced around doing handiwork for the people in town.

In 1984, Justin, a high school sophomore, is the star of the varsity high school basketball team, and Susan could often be seen in the stands sporting a sweatshirt screen printed with Justin’s jersey number. His dad, though, never made it to one game. Many nights after he and his mom returned from one of his basketball games, Justin stepped over his father, who was passed out in the doorway. Susan would pick Jerry up and drag him to their bedroom as the phone bounced off the hook, constantly ringing, from a steady stream of girls vying for Justin’s attention.

The family curse affected each of the men differently, though the root cause was the same. Peter became a molester; Jim committed suicide; his son, Jerry, became an alcoholic; and his grandson, Justin, was a womanizer. Unresolved guilt, hurt, pain, and shame was the emotional baggage handed down in the family’s generational curse. Without a strong positive father figure, the second and third generations were left to deal with the hurt and shame experienced by the first generation and to figure out how to become men on their own.

Everyone has been affected by dysfunctional behavior, if not through their family, then through their job, church, or community. Perhaps you can remember lying awake at night listening to your neighbor abuse his love interest. Maybe you watched over and over as the youth pastor or priest exhibited a stronger interest in one child as they disappeared into rooms alone. Or maybe you’ve suffered at the hands (or media coverage) of a mass shooter. However you were affected, everyone has some emotional baggage, and they may or may not be properly working through it.

Some people keep their story secret because they’ve suppressed it so well they aren’t immediately aware of it. Others keep it a secret because they think they’d just die if anyone found out. Unfortunately, emotional baggage can cause us to become stuck. It creates insecurities that prohibit us from living our best life in the moment. Insecurities can show up as self-doubt, negative self-talk, low self-esteem, arrogance, conceit, low self-confidence, worry, or indecisiveness. Behaviors that can become dysfunctional are belittling, intimidating, neglecting, hitting, baiting, threatening, manipulating, lying, choking, abstaining, and indulging.

When we’re stuck, the effects aren’t always obvious or overt. For example, we’ve earned two college degrees but still cannot break the desired six-figure income ceiling. We’re smart, beautiful, and accomplished but can’t find genuine romantic love. We’re always around loads of friends and have managed to establish a social calendar that would make Oprah and Gayle blush, but we feel lonely, lost, and purposeless. We’re driven, task-oriented, and the highest producer quarter after quarter, but life still feels aimless and empty. We’ve got the gorgeous husband and brilliant kids, but we feel invisible and underappreciated.

Occurrences are bubbling over, becoming systemic and uncontrollable in homes, schools, and workplaces all over the country. Divorce, addiction, domestic violence, and sexual abuse are social ills that create deep-seated emotional baggage that seeps from the secrecy of our families into mainstream malls, entertainment complexes, and workplaces. Over time they deteriorate the soul of the person carrying the hurt and shame of the trauma, causing that person to inflict wounds on other people. Every problem you have is your responsibility, regardless of who caused it. Take responsibility to not pass your pain to the next generation.

Managing emotional wellness with silence has driven us into a hurricane of destruction on every societal level—from the family to the workplace, church, and school. The bad news is that emotional baggage is killing our communities. The good news is that over the last decade or so, the tide has turned, and emotional wellness is now a societal priority. No longer are we expected to nurse our wounds in silence. It’s the best time to find your authentic self and live a fulfilled life of joy. At no other time in history have we had as many life coaches, counselors, and clinicians abundantly available to assist you or corporate brands publicly championing for mental health causes and social responsibility. Now is the time for you to move past the stories that cause you pain. This is your moment. This is your pivotal place in space and time. It is no longer a situation of chance—you get to decide to win!

CRACK THE MASK, BREAK THE MOLD

With this book, I want to help you accept your past and decide it will no longer control your future. I want you to discover the past experiences that created your limiting beliefs and fuel your sabotaging behavior so you can beam with joy from the inside out. I want you to utilize the process of continuous growth and development. Living the same year ninety-nine times is not living a life. There’s more, and you can do more than have it—you can thrive in it. I want you to remove the restrictions your past has put on your ability to feel free to live true to your own personality, spirit, and character.

You have to crack the mask to define success and happiness for yourself: In your wildest dreams, what would give you the greatest joy? Think of three things that, if you owned them or earned them, would make you feel like you are living your best life. For example, my three things would be a private jet, a five-acre estate, and a home management staff—no debt. What are your three things? Now, let’s do this. Pick up your cell phone (yes, I know it is right there next to you), join my Facebook Group at https://www.ThatAnitaLive.com/group, and post your “Best Life Top 3.” We are a safe circle of compassion and understanding. Who knows, your “Best Life Top 3” may pop up in your direct messages when you least expect it as a reminder that dreams do come true—you just have to put in the work.

But understand, time is of the essence. Change is evident and always evolving. Just as times changed to produce a new day of pride in one’s authentic self, it can quickly change to make anyone with an emotional issue a dangerous detriment to society. The focus of pop culture and public opinion is largely dependent upon the latest major headline—good or bad. The pendulum swing affects the openness with which we can practice self-help. Today, hashtags that end in “pride” fill every social media timeline daily, but how long will we be able to live unashamed? No one knows, which is why you need to move to create the life you were destined to live now. It’s time to soar to your next level in life. Will you continue to go round and round on the merry-go-round of sameness, or will you jump and reach for destiny’s brass ring of happiness and success?

IT’S YOUR TIME TO SOAR

In this book, I’m educating, entertaining, and teaching you a new process for dealing with emotional baggage. This process will not only help you to stop living an aimless life but will teach you how to sustain your momentum and steadily accomplish your goals. I’m going to educate you by demonstrating how childhood trauma becomes adult dysfunctional behavior through my own personal stories. I’m going to entertain you with my southern colloquialisms and quick-witted tongue but also by showing you the silver lining to your own dark clouds, the good things that have come out of all those tough times. Lastly, I’m going to teach you how to defend and prioritize what is most important—your happiness and your health.

That new process is my 7-Step Method, which got me off the emotional spin cycle. The basic format of the chapters in Section I are the same. First, I share a personal story highlighting a certain type of abuse and its lasting effects. In some chapters, I give you multiple examples of abusive incidents. I need you to know abusive behavior is not a onetime event. When a survivor says “I was abused,” the listener hears and sees one single event. I need you to see, hear, and feel that abuse is repetitive and will persist as long as the perpetrator has access to the victim.

Each chapter will also feature a Lesson to Learn section highlighting the dysfunctional behavior resulting from the abuse (the effects), and how the 7-Step Method can be used to overcome the maladaptive behavior (the technique). The activities will teach you how to minimize toxicity, maximize what serves you, and enjoy a meaningful life. Section II of this book—chapters seven, eight, and nine—shares with you how to keep your momentum going once you’ve gotten free.

The Techniques of the 7-Step Method are:

Step One – Life Mapping Step Two – Track and Trace Step Three – Dispose of Distractions Step Four – Celebrating Self Step Five – Inner Peace and Quiet Step Six – Emotional Equation (Performance Review) Step Seven – Gratitude and Give Back

My Successful 7-Step Method Affirmations include:

1. The better I know the person within, the happier I can make her.

2. I am the master of my emotions. I control them, they don’t control me.

3. Having boundaries shows I want self-respect. Forcing people to adhere to my boundaries shows I have self-respect.

4. I am precious.

5. I am peace. I am peaceful. I am at peace.

6. I am in a perfecting process.

7. I am receiving goodness and giving greatness back.

My successful 7-Step Method Activities include:

1. Life Mapping 2. Tracking and Tracing 3. Disposing of Distractions 4. Celebrating Self 5. Inner Peace and Quiet (Bonus: Finding My Father Collage) 6. Solving Your Emotional Equation 7. Gratitude and Give Back (Bonus activity: Creating a Family of Choice)

This book does not include a comprehensive list of all of the Affirmations, Techniques, or Activities in my 7-Step Method. It does include all the steps. However, I’ve carefully selected the specific Affirmation, Technique, and Activity that best correspond with the lesson to be learned from the True Story in the chapter.

WHY LISTEN TO ME?

I hear you, I hear you. Who is this woman and why should I listen to her? Why should I continue to read this book? Let me give you four reasons: my education, my career experience, my personal experience, and most important—my gift.

I’ve earned three degrees—a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics, a Master of Education in Counseling, and a Master in Business Administration—and I do mean earned. I attended all my own classes, wrote all my own papers, and conducted all my own research. I learned from professors that cared more for my well-rounded, intellectual development and my ability to rise to the top than my feelings.

But I’m not just heavy on the education side; I’m also qualified by career experience. I’ve counseled, coached, and trained hundreds of people between the ages of eleven and fifty through their own personal transformations and professional endeavors. I’ve been a summer teen program counselor and a middle school guidance counselor. I’ve worked as a counselor in a life skills, education, and technical job training program as well as a career services counselor at a college. And I’m still that one friend everyone seeks out when they need help with their challenges. In addition, as you will learn in later chapters, I’ve been on every side of emotional baggage.

I am an expert because of the combination of my education, career experience, personal experience, and heavenly gifting at identifying where you’re stuck and mapping out how to move you from where you are to where you want to be in life. Yes, I said “heavenly gifting.” Consider what world-renowned celebrity personality Steve Harvey tells his audiences all over the world about The Gift:

“At birth God gave each and every one of us a gift. A gift is something you do the absolute best, with the least amount of effort. Gifts are more than just running, jumping, singing, and dancing. Your gift is where your success and happiness will be found.”

My gift is counseling—picking apart people’s insecurities and helping them find their emotional wellness. When life throws everything at you, when you’re buried under the mess of this world, I am the hand that you reach for, the hand that will pull you out of the dust, dirt, and mud, then teach you how to live a life of joy, love, and peace.

ARE YOU WITH ME?

Nothing gives you a better understanding of a topic than a 360-degree experience, and as I’ve said, I’ve been the victim, the witness, and the conduit God uses to heal.

Using that full panoramic view, I have made this my mission—you will:

· Be EQUIPPED to boldly go beyond your comfort zone and refresh, reinvent, and revise your life for the better.

· Learn how to TRANSFORM negative thinking into positive thinking with 7 affirmations, 7 results-driven techniques, and 7 actionable activities.

· Learn how to DEFY your limiting beliefs about yourself and create a life you’ll love living.

· Be EMPOWERED to do more for yourself and demand even more from others.

· Learn how to CHANGE your self-sabotaging behavior.

· Learn how to RELEASE fear.

· Be MOVED by the vivid and transparent personal stories of violent abuse to realize you are not the only one with a past and it doesn’t define your destiny or stop you from getting it.

In chapter two we’ll examine the importance of self-awareness and why no one should know you better than you. We’ll review the benefits and the life-changing effects each benefit can have on us. Turn the page, and let’s get started.

( Continued… )

© 2018 All rights reserved. Book excerpt reprinted by permission of the author, Anita Washington. Do not reproduce, copy or use without the author’s written permission. This excerpt is used for promotional purposes only.

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About the Author Anita Washington, M.Ed. & M.B.A., CEO & Founder of That Anita Live, LLC, host of the TV show That Anita Live and The Emotional Happiness Podcast with That Anita Live provides a platform for women to learn, laugh and more importantly heal emotionally by learning from the challenges and successes of others.

A former school and community agency counselor and creator of the 7-Step Method, Anita’s helped guide people from the ages of eleven to fifty through their own life issues, personal transformations and professional endeavors. With an old soul and a comedic, honest voice. She uses many southern colloquialisms and colorful expressions to unwrap personal stories of surviving a homicidal alcoholic father, a mother in denial and four physically and emotionally abusive brothers and relates them to guiding principles and healing techniques.

Through her powerful and uplifting interviews at ThatAnitaLive.TV and The Emotional Happiness Podcast women get to see and hear real women with resourceful stories living relentless lives after life’s most devastating events. Through her charismatic and compelling speaking, Anita helps women use the tools and resources they already have to reveal and release success blockers such as childhood trauma and family dysfunction to build self-confidence, boost their self-esteem and feel free to live true to their own personality, spirit and character.

She has self-published two books: number one ranked ebook, 7 Simple Steps to Beat Emotional Baggage: How To Become Whole, Healed, Healthy & Happy, which shares actionable techniques that will walk women through letting go of the past and rising above the glass ceiling to reach higher levels of success and satisfaction in life and newly released book (ebook and paperback), Family Is Not Everything: How To Minimize Their Mess, Maximize Your Happiness and Enjoy Emotional Baggage Breakthroughs which shares trauma stories you can relate to along with the seven techniques, affirmations and activities to help you heal.

From nine-to-five, Anita is a Senior Acquisition Support Specialist, possessing over nineteen years of performing and administering program management and cradle-to-grave commercial and federal contracting activities for acquisitions ranging from $500,000 to over $2 Billion. She has progressively worked her way up the federal acquisition life-cycle and commercial supply chain through various positions from pre-award and requirements definition to commodities buying to contract close-out. In her career, she has mastered the art of transitioning to level-up.

Anita is a graduate of Limestone College, Virginia State University, and Strayer University with a B.S. in Mathematics, an M.Ed. in Guidance & Counseling, and an M.B.A. in Contracts & Acquisitions. You can find Anita online at ThatAnitaLive.com, Twitter, Periscope, Instagram and Facebook. Her handle is That Anita Live on all four social media platforms.

Family Is Not Everything: How To Minimize Their Mess, Maximize Your Happiness and Enjoy Emotional Baggage Breakthroughs by Anita Washington Are people constantly dumping their negative energy on you? Do you find yourself bombarded with painful thoughts from your past?

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How Racism Breaks the Human Body

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How Racism Breaks the Human Body

Kaari Aubrey was in preschool when she tried to rub off her brown skin.

Her classmates at her school in Athens, Ohio, were passing a ball back and forth in the school’s playroom when Kaari noticed they weren’t including her. For a while, she pled with them to let her play, but when that didn’t work, she burst into tears. Moments later, a white girl who was playing announced that the others shouldn’t include Kaari because she was “dirty.”

“My hands were clean,” Kaari says, remembering that afternoon. “I didn’t think I was dirty.”

When her white classmate clarified, laughing, that it was Kaari’s brown complexion she considered dirty, Kaari escaped to her cubby, furiously rubbing her arm in an attempt to get the color off.

“It smelled like burnt clay,” Kaari recalls matter-of-factly. At 24, she’s now a teacher living far away from Athens in her Brooklyn apartment, but she still remembers the smell of the rug burn vividly. She also recalls being unaware of the gravity of the situation until she got home and her mother, Lisa Aubrey, began to ask questions.

Lisa is an Arizona State University professor who teaches African and African American studies and political science and splits her time between Arizona and Cameroon. “I saw her rubbing her skin, desperately, almost violently,” Lisa says. “I asked her what was going on. She told me she wanted to rub off her skin and that she wanted to look like the other girls.”

Lisa and Kaari both recall facing discrimination frequently when they lived in Ohio. Kaari remembers being called “a n*gger” on occasions and being asked if she “spoke African.”

Soon after the incident on the playground, two things in the Aubreys’ lives changed.

First, the mild eczema Kaari suffered from as a baby returned. Eczema is a skin condition that behaves like an allergy and can worsen with stress, so the condition came back more intensely and incessantly after being bullied by her classmate in the playroom.

Second, people in their community became intolerable. “They became patronizing and presumptuous and even started dropping by my house to ‘check’ on my parenting,” Lisa says. “As I reflect, some of the parents of Kaari’s schoolmates became more overtly racist as well and often didn’t even recognize their racism, I think.”

As a result, Lisa moved the pair out of Ohio to Arizona, and eventually to Ghana, where they lived for a six years.

In November 2017, NPR published an article about how racism can have physical implications for those subjected to it. “In studying black women, for example,” they reported, “[social epidemiologist Amani Nuru-Jeter] found that chronic stress from frequent racist encounters is associated with chronic low-grade inflammation — a little like having a low fever all the time.”

Nuru-Jeter and others found that the body’s natural reaction to stress can wear down those who experience that stress long-term. That same chronic stress actually changes the genes of the victims of racism, a fact that fits in with previous research finding that trauma can be passed down through generations.

Another study cited in the article by behavioral scientist Arline T. Geronimus found that after a 2008 Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raid in Postville, Iowa — which “saw more than a tenth of the town detained” and focused on people who “looked Latino” — some local Latina women started giving birth to smaller babies. A follow-up NPR piece also found that black mothers are more likely to lose their babies or deliver prematurely because of the stresses of racism.

When I interviewed Kaari about her experience on the playground in Athens, Lisa told me she had read somewhere that “being black is bad for your health.” After so many years of research on the topic, we now know that statement is true, at least in the U.S. The question that remains is how to solve this problem. What can be done to fix these disparities in wellness when the causes are so institutionalized? And why, after so many years of study, hasn’t more been done to change the way people of color are treated for illnesses?

Susanne Babbel is a San Francisco psychotherapist who specializes in trauma and is the author of the upcoming book Heal the Body, Heal the Mind: A Somatic Approach to Moving Beyond Trauma. She says that when a body experiences trauma — whether physical, emotional or verbal — it prepares to fight, flee or freeze. This means that when Kaari was in the playroom that day, not only was she emotionally traumatized, her body was also completing complex physical processes to solve the problem of her “otherness.”

Her heart rate may have sped up or slowed, blood may have moved to her limbs as she prepared to flee and hormones like adrenaline were fluctuating. Kaari’s body was preparing her for an act of survival. The problem for her and other people of color who experience racism is that there is no “solution” for blackness or brownness. Their bodies are preparing for a threat that will persist until the day racism ceases to exist.

Dr. Babbel says there are major health impacts when individuals face long-lasting, pervasive abuse like the name-calling and bullying that often dovetail everyday forms of racism, explaining that “we get stuck in a state of fight, flight or freeze. When we always have stress hormones, what does that do? It attacks the body. It hijacks the logical brain. The nervous system has to be addressed.”

Dr. Babble explains that when our nervous systems — the network of nerves that web throughout each of our bodies from our spines to our limbs to our brains and our skin, brown or otherwise — are worn down by chronic stress, we begin to think and feel differently. We experience symptoms like chronic pain, thyroid dysfunction and immune disorders. We can become depressed or hypervigilant.

“When people experience racism [or] when they are put down and humiliated [in general] … ,” she adds, “they disconnect from their bodies and themselves. There is a general disconnect.”

Christ-Shamma Matalbert, a 20-year-old student at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff, remembers being teased mercilessly after she emigrated to the U.S. from Haiti due to the devastating effects of the 2010 earthquake on her home country. Learning English and adjusting to her new surroundings while being bullied sent Christ-Shamma (who goes by Shamma) reeling into anxiety, depression and what she calls “a lack of hopefulness.”

“I didn’t like going into the cafeteria because of all of the eyes that would be staring like I was an object,” Shamma says. “I felt like I was the only one and the world was against me. Even now, I feel like this in different circumstances.”

As a seventh grader, Shamma’s reaction was to distance herself — to write, to try to ignore how her classmates were treating her, and to freeze, as trauma victims sometimes do. But this year, when Shamma heard President Trump’s remarks about Haiti, she decided to fight. She took to Twitter to write about her accomplishments and her pride in her country. Mixed among the comments of support below the post are insults like “lowlife” and “human garbage,” but Shamma appears to be unbothered. “All of the foreign students were standing up and representing, so I made it my issue to do the same.”

In her 2003 book, Soothe Your Nerves: The Black Woman’s Guide to Understanding and Overcoming Anxiety, Panic and Fear, psychologist Angela Neal-Barnett points out that black women respond to stress in a way that is distinct from others. After finding common ground with other women and nurturing those around us (which is common among women of all races), black women eventually stuff down our pain and commit ourselves to rising above bias. Such is the making of what Neal-Barnett refers to as the “Strong Black Woman”:

“Rather than being seen as less than she [what] is supposed to be, a Strong Black Woman refuses to admit she is stressed and keeps her feelings and emotions bottled up inside while she helps everyone else. This strategy makes the Strong Black Woman an excellent candidate for the development of anxiety.”

In fact, when Dr. Neal-Barnett studied women who identified themselves as “strong black women,” the results of heart rate monitoring showed they experience as much stress as anyone else. The difference was that most of these women described themselves as some version of calm, even when their heart rates were spiking.

“Several said to me, ‘Baby, I don’t have time to think about that mess. If I did, I’d be stressed out about everything,’” says Dr. Neal-Barnett. “Yet taking the time out to acknowledge the stress and do something about it would go a long way toward preventing the development of serious anxiety and the health problems associated with it — chronic upper respiratory infections, hypertension, heart disease and obesity.”

Shamma, the Arkansas student who froze and later fought when faced with discrimination, admits to feeling depressed and anxious when she was bullied as a child, and talks of later dismissing the pain to speak up for other immigrants in a way that affirmed her strength. After exposing her feelings, though, Matalbert neatly packed them back up.

I can’t blame her. I do the same thing. I’ve found the narrative of strength far easier to share than the narrative of ongoing pain. We all want a happy ending.

Last month, while standing around my aunt’s kitchen table, my father recalled a hernia operation he’d had when I was a little girl. My father is now a full-time artist and part-time teacher at the Art Students League of New York, but back then, he worked full-time as a backstage carpenter at Lincoln Center in New York City and only part-time on his art.

Working as a stagehand was a physically demanding job that put him at constant risk of injury, so when he was diagnosed with a hernia, it shouldn’t have been a surprise. I cannot deny, though, that I was shocked when he returned home from the hospital, stumbling into the lobby of our apartment building and retching into one of the trash cans.

During our conversation in my aunt’s kitchen, I found out that my father had been refused pain medication when he’d requested it that day. He’d laid there in his hospital bed in excruciating pain, begging for the painkillers he wouldn’t receive until he threatened the supervising doctor with a lawsuit.

How can a patient trust a doctor whose racism may be contributing to their own illness?

In 2016, The Washington Post published a story revealing that black people are less likely to be treated for their pain because of the implicit biases held by medical students and doctors about their physical makeup. More than half of medical students and residents who were surveyed believed that “blacks’ skin is thicker than whites.” Others believed that black people have less sensitive nerve endings. “Doctors Don’t Always Believe You When You’re a Black Woman,” an article published in Vice in February of this year, recounts black women’s experiences with doctors who failed to trust them.

If black people like my father or the women cited in Vice’s piece are not believed when they describe symptoms as straightforward as post-op pain or headaches, what hope do they have of being treated for more complicated problems caused by pervasive racism? How can a patient trust a doctor whose racism may be contributing to their own illness?

Kaari, the teacher in Brooklyn who was viciously bullied in Ohio, tries to treat herself. “I tell myself, ‘You’re beautiful. Your skin is beautiful,’ [but] even now, to this day, I’m still self-conscious. I get eczema associated with that shame. [It] is amplified by stress that I’m causing myself. The more I get it, the more I’m frustrated with myself.” She asks herself, “’Why can’t you just deal with it? Why can’t you just get over it?’”

While Dr. Babbel says that talk therapy is a solution for individuals’ chronic stress, healing battered nervous systems is equally important. She tells me about the vagus nerve, located in the face, which is calmed by activities like humming. “That’s why people in church sing,” she says, “to have courage and to calm themselves down.”

For a second, I feel relieved. It’s inspiring that we’ve been working to heal ourselves all along. But then, the thought is sobering. I don’t think I’ll ever hear those psalms in church the same way again, knowing now, for certain, that these are the voices of people literally crying out for healing.

Collages by Louisiana Mei Gelpi; Art Direction by Emily Zirimis.

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foursprout-blog · 6 years

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This Is How To Quit Bad Habits Without Willpower: 3 Secrets From Neuroscience

New Post has been published on http://foursprout.com/happiness/this-is-how-to-quit-bad-habits-without-willpower-3-secrets-from-neuroscience/

This Is How To Quit Bad Habits Without Willpower: 3 Secrets From Neuroscience

***

Before we commence with the festivities, I wanted to thank everyone for helping my first book become a Wall Street Journal bestseller. To check it out, click here.

***

Got any serious bad habits? The extra-strength ones with the FDA warning. The kind you really beat yourself up about — but still engage in all the time?

Procrastination that screws up the quality of your work? Epic tidal waves of laziness? Or cardiac-threatening levels of overwork? Snapping at the ones you love? Or not speaking up even when you know you should?

We’re going to turn everything you know about bad habits on its head. For starters, here’s the good news: you’re not lazy, you’re not a screw up, and you’re not a bad person. In fact, you don’t actually have “bad habits” at all. Those tempting or nagging voices in your head aren’t evil. Actually, they’re trying to help you.

Yeah, I know: I have a lot of ‘splaining to do. But before it all makes sense, we’ll need to wade into a bit more crazy. Pixar films, neuroscience, multiple personalities, mindfulness, “Fight Club”, and boatloads of you talking to yourself like you’re nuts…

Yes, weird, but totally legit. In fact, there’s a whole system of psychology based around this: Internal Family Systems (IFS.) It’s been shown to help people with everything under the sun from depression, to anxiety, eating disorders, addictions, and even some of the most serious stuff like PTSD.

From Internal Family Systems Skills Training Manual:

In the IFS Complex Trauma Study, only one subject out of 13 still qualified for a diagnosis of PTSD after finishing 16 weeks of IFS therapy.

This is a system that can help you overcome almost any bad behavior, deal with deep-seated issues and even help you love yourself a bit more.

We’re going deep here. Warning: we’re entering “the therapy zone.” It’s gonna get touchy-feely and a little awkward. I’m often skeptical of this kinda stuff myself. But when something works, it works.

Alright, hold my inner child’s hand and we’ll do this together. Let’s get to it…

You’re Not Lazy, Weak, Or Awful

I posted recently about “the modular mind.” Basically, this is the theory that there is no singular “you.” There are many different selves inside you that take turns running the ship and that’s why human behavior (including yours and mine) can be so random and frustrating. When you say, “I wasn’t myself” that’s far more accurate than you ever thought.

(I’m not going to rehash the entire theory because regular readers would rise up and slay me for repeating myself. If you want the full scoop, click here.)

There are many different yous in your head. William James was saying it back in the 19th century, and now every major division of psychology is on board with this idea, including neuroscience.

From The Body Keeps the Score:

Michael Gazzaniga, who conducted pioneering split-brain research, concluded that the mind is composed of semiautonomous functioning modules, each of which has a special role. In his book The Social Brain (1985) he writes, “But what of the idea that the self is not a unified being, and there may exist within us several realms of consciousness? . . . From our [split-brain] studies the new idea emerges that there are literally several selves, and they do not necessarily ‘converse’ with each other internally.” MIT scientist Marvin Minsky, a pioneer of artificial intelligence, declared: “The legend of the single Self can only divert us from the target of that inquiry. . . . [I]t can make sense to think there exists, inside your brain, a society of different minds. Like members of a family, the different minds can work together to help each other, each still having its own mental experiences that the others never know about.”

I know what some of you are thinking:

And, yes, Inside Out *is* based on this research. (In fact, Dr. Frank Anderson acted as a consultant to Pixar during the making of the film and wrote one of the books I read to prepare for this post.)

So how does this relate to bad habits? You don’t have “bad habits” — you have different selves with different goals in your head, all trying to do what they think is best for the greater “you.”

The problem is they’re not always right about what’s best and the goals of Self 1 may conflict with the goals of Self 2. (Paging Tyler Durden. Tyler Durden please come to the front desk.)

IFS therapists refer to the different “yous” as “parts.”

From Self-Therapy:

Parts are entities of their own, with their own feelings, beliefs, motivations, and memories. It is especially important to understand that parts have motivations for everything they do. Nothing is just done out of habit. Nothing is just a pattern of thinking or behavior you learned. Everything (except for purely physiological reactions) is done by a part for a reason, even though that reason may be unconscious.

Through this lens, I see bad habits as an “autoimmune disorder of the mind.” And with that, crazy as it may sound, things actually start to make a lot more sense.

How can you procrastinate and feel guilty about it at the same time? Two different “yous” disagreeing. Part of you is afraid of being a loser and wants to accomplish things — but another part of you is afraid of being all stressed out and wants to watch Netflix and eat popcorn. Neither is “lazy.”

(It might also explain how a blogger’s ex can have both fear of abandonment and fear of intimacy, but that’s a story for another day, Bubba.)

You need to understand what other-you is trying to accomplish and find a better way to address the underlying need so you can both get on the same page.

(To learn more about the science of a successful life, check out my new book here.)

So who are these other selves? When it comes to problematic behaviors, there are three flavors we need to be concerned with…

Exiles, Managers and Firefighters

We all have fears. And we try to cope with those fears. And by “we” I mean the “we” in your head. Allow me to introduce the cast of characters that are causing the “problems”:

Exiles:

This is the annoyingly dramatic name that therapists give to the seat of your deep, dark fears and long-held negative beliefs. “I’m stupid.” “I’m a failure.” “I’m unlovable.” “I can’t trust anyone.”

Yup, this is the “inner child.” (It might be the first time you’ve heard the term in a non-mocking context. I mean, I’m going to mock it plenty because it’s a corny term, but this is its more proper usage.)

Bad stuff happens to us and we take away painful lessons that we don’t let go. And these fears often unconsciously guide our actions in frustrating ways.

Managers:

So how do you still manage to function with those fears? Well, the inner child has an overprotective parent. These are “Managers.” That nagging voice in your head. It says you’re not working hard enough. That you’re weak. That you need to do more. That the world is going to end if you don’t make everyone happy and live up to expectations.

It thinks if you gave in to the fears of the inner child you’d be paralyzed, so it harasses you endlessly and occasionally steers “you” to behave in ways that aren’t aligned with your goals.

From Internal Family Systems Skills Training Manual:

We call proactive parts “managers” because they try to manage our lives in ways that keep emotional pain out of consciousness. They often focus on motivating us to improve, work hard, be productive and be socially acceptable. At the extreme, however, these aims can devolve into tactics like perfectionism, intellectualizing, one-sided caretaking, obsessing about appearance, conflict avoidance at great personal cost and trying to control or please others.

At times, this is useful. You do need to go to work when you don’t feel like it, or you’ll lose your job and be miserable. Then again, Managers may also nag you to keep working until you pass out — also making you miserable.

Managers still see you as an irresponsible child and feel you wouldn’t wear clean underwear if they didn’t remind you 50 times a day.

Firefighters:

Sometimes the Manager doesn’t do its job well. Or you just don’t listen. And the Exile’s fears get all wound up. Maybe the Exile is terrified of losing its independence — always being told what to do and feeling disrespected.

To prevent the Exile from totally freaking out, the “independence” Firefighter goes extreme to immediately solve the problem. “DON’T TELL ME WHAT TO DO!” And you procrastinate by eating ice cream and playing video games. (The independence Firefighter is, unsurprisingly, perpetually 15 years old.)

From Internal Family Systems Skills Training Manual:

(Firefighters) share the same goal as managers; they want to exile vulnerable parts and extinguish emotional pain. However, (firefighters) are emergency response workers. They get activated after the fact, when the memories and emotions of exiles break through despite the repressive efforts of managers. (Firefighters) tend to be fierce and use extreme measures that managers abhor, like alcohol and drug abuse, binge eating, excessive shopping, promiscuity, cutting, suicide and even homicide.

You’ve got fears, whether they’re remaining independent, or not being liked, or not feeling like a failure. The Managers try to solve them in one way. And when things really go south, the Firefighters try to solve them in the most immediate, extreme way possible. They’re all trying their best — but they’re not always effective.

So this dysfunctional family is fighting in your head and your behavior looks like a chaotic mess because you’re not even conscious of the conflicting goals everyone has.

You can’t “banish” any of these three so we gotta get them on the same page. That means keeping the Firefighters calm, getting the Managers to trust you, and figuring out what the Exile really needs to feel secure.

(To learn the seven-step morning ritual that will make you happy all day, click here.)

Alright, Dr. Jekyll, get everyone in the car. We’re going to therapy…

1) Get Calm

Sit down somewhere quiet. Take a few deep breaths. Relax. You want to be chill, centered and accepting.

Why? Because you want to make sure you’re you. Getting emotional is what signals the Manager to start nagging or — even worse– the Firefighters to start whacking at the front door with axes.

Now think about the primary “bad habit” or issue you’re dealing with. Picture the “Manager” behind it:

Is it an overprotective parent that pushes you to work too hard?

Or a slacker that’s always tempting you to procrastinate?

A nagging perfectionist voice that says you’re never smart enough or beautiful enough?

Or a critical voice that tells you not to trust people?

(To learn the 3 secrets from neuroscience that will make you emotionally intelligent, click here.)

Take a second and imagine that voice as a real, full-blown person. Because you’re about to have a conversation with them.

Look, I told you this was going to get weird…

2) Talk To Them… Um, I Mean, You

Yes, you’re going to talk to yourself like you have multiple personalities. Because, well, you do. It’s not quite as odd as you think, really.

Research shows talking to yourself can make you smarter, improve your memory, help you focus and even increase athletic performance. And talking to yourself in the second person (saying “you” instead of “I”) makes a difference:

Altogether, the current research showed that second-person self-talk strengthens both actual behavior performance and prospective behavioral intentions more than first-person self-talk.

Beyond that, we’re talking about “bad” behavior here. You need to get your ego out of the way. It’s a lot easier to honestly answer questions about bad habits you aren’t proud of when you can ask “someone else” why “they” do that instead of why “I” do that.

So play along. Stay relaxed. Don’t try and get this voice that’s been bothering you to go away. We want to hear what they have to say. Be curious and compassionate, not all judgy. Remember: they’re just trying to help (in their annoying, ineffective way.)

Ask them questions. A few good ones are:

What’s your role in my life?

What are you trying to protect me from?

And the big money question:

What are you afraid would happen if you didn’t do this job anymore?

How would that Manager respond? Really inhabit the role. It’s not that hard — you’ve probably been hearing this voice in your head for years. A “Procrastinating Manager” might reply with something like this:

My role in your life? I have to make sure you relax and don’t get all stressed out about work. I’m trying to protect you from treating every project at the office like a life or death scenario. If I didn’t do my job you’d be a basket case. So I encourage you to have some fun on the internet and play with your phone to relax. And, frankly, you treat me like some slacker when all I want is to make sure your head doesn’t explode from stress.

Accept and acknowledge what they say to you. Don’t get in an argument with yourself (although, from my perspective, that would be really funny.)

If you feel like you understand one another, next you want to ask for permission to talk to the Exile. Yeah, this is odd. Like some sort of therapy séance. But it works. That Manager’s voice has been chattering at you for years. It’s a person. If you don’t give it some respect, you’ll just get more stress.

(To learn the 4 rituals from neuroscience that will make you happy, click here.)

Did you get permission? Okay, here’s where it gets really interesting. And weird. But interesting…

3) Talk To The Exile

Meet your inner child. Aren’t they adorable? They look like you but smaller and probably scared out of their wits — which is why you’re here.

You know what the Manager is doing to achieve its goals, whether that’s making you work too hard, not work enough, or occasionally screaming at the people who love you most. So now we’re getting to the meat.

Ask the kid what they’re afraid of. Inhabit the role. What fear is so powerful that this kid actually has employees running around to protect him?

Be gentle. If the kid (and, again, that’s you) gets worked up, you may have those Firefighters smashing your windows as you go all emo and need to spend the evening on the couch eating ice cream and watching reruns of your favorite tv show. So stay calm. Be gentle. And listen:

I’m afraid of failing. Doing the work makes me think about it not turning out well. And then I’ll be a loser and no one will like me.

So you know what the kid’s afraid of. And why the Manager does what it does to protect them. And so rather than a failure of willpower, you know why — deep down — you’re engaging in those “bad habits.”

The kid’s fears might be totally extreme or unfounded. But they’re your fears. And you’re acting on them. So, in that sense, they’re real and need to be taken seriously. Don’t dismiss anything.

You want to start addressing these underlying concerns that your inner rugrat has. Fix those and the bad habits take care of themselves. Assure the kid and the Manager that you’re going to work on this. You’ll make a plan. That you’ll be accountable. Maybe even involve a friend.

Sound ridiculous? What’s ridiculous is endlessly trying different ineffective ways to stop procrastinating when you could be addressing the underlying issue. If you get rid of the fear, the Manager (let alone the Firefighters) don’t need to do their jobs anymore and they go away. (Or maybe your mental HR department reassigns them to another role like making you unable to get a song out of your head. Who knows.)

Of course, if you’re dealing with extremely serious issues you want to do all this with a therapist, not off a blog post written by some random guy on the internet. I hope that’s obvious but I have an internal Manager with a law degree who insisted I type it because my own inner child’s deep-seated fear is getting sued.

You don’t need willpower or more self-control or discipline. You need to get to know yourself a little better. So ask. And listen. And you’ll be amazed what you’ll tell yourself.

(To learn the six rituals from ancient wisdom that will make you happy, click here.)

Okay, your time in therapy is up. Let’s do a quick review and find out the best part about talking to Managers, inner children and the rest of the circus in your noggin…

Sum Up

Here’s how to quit bad habits without willpower:

There are no bad habits, just different selves with conflicting goals: You can read this post for more, or you can go watch Inside Out. (One of these is a far more effective option. The other was written by me.)

Exiles, Managers and Firefighters: The three big categories of voices in your head. Exiles have deep-seated fears, Managers make sure those don’t get triggered, and when they do get triggered, Firefighters put out the fire (and destroy your house in the process.)

Stay calm and talk to the Manager: Find out why they do what they do by asking… well, you.

Talk to your inner child: I’m cringing that I typed that. But, corny as it sounds, it really does help. Discover your fears. That’s what’s driving your “bad behavior.”

This won’t be quick. It won’t be easy. I have oversimplified the process because some people are already whining that this post is too long. (Whatever. They only read the “Sum Up” anyway.)

You probably have multiple Exiles, and a bunch of Managers and a squadron of Firefighters — complete with their own adorable Dalmatian. (You don’t need to have a conversation with the Dalmatian, but if you’re feeling really creative you may mentally pet him.)

Understand what’s really driving your behavior and you can really fix your life. Find out what your fears are. Get to the root of the issue and you won’t need 37 new ineffective lifehacks every week. (Did I just put myself out of a job? Crap.)

You hear a lot about “knowing yourself,” “loving yourself” and “being your own best friend.” Those sayings are warm and fuzzy. They’re also vague platitudes that you have no idea how to actually get started on. Well, we just changed that.

There are multiple yous. You can get to know them by talking to them, as awkward as the process may be. And instead of rejecting nagging or tempting voices, you can befriend them, because as misguided as their actions are sometimes, they really do want the best for you.

From Self-Therapy:

Loving yourself really means loving each of your parts. Befriending yourself means developing a relationship with each of your parts and having them trust you.

Get to know yourself so you can love yourself. All your selves.

Join over 320,000 readers. Get a free weekly update via email here.

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The post This Is How To Quit Bad Habits Without Willpower: 3 Secrets From Neuroscience appeared first on Barking Up The Wrong Tree.

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foursprouthappiness-blog · 6 years

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This Is How To Quit Bad Habits Without Willpower: 3 Secrets From Neuroscience

New Post has been published on http://foursprout.com/happiness/this-is-how-to-quit-bad-habits-without-willpower-3-secrets-from-neuroscience/

This Is How To Quit Bad Habits Without Willpower: 3 Secrets From Neuroscience

***

Before we commence with the festivities, I wanted to thank everyone for helping my first book become a Wall Street Journal bestseller. To check it out, click here.

***

Got any serious bad habits? The extra-strength ones with the FDA warning. The kind you really beat yourself up about — but still engage in all the time?

From Internal Family Systems Skills Training Manual:

In the IFS Complex Trauma Study, only one subject out of 13 still qualified for a diagnosis of PTSD after finishing 16 weeks of IFS therapy.

This is a system that can help you overcome almost any bad behavior, deal with deep-seated issues and even help you love yourself a bit more.

Alright, hold my inner child’s hand and we’ll do this together. Let’s get to it…

You’re Not Lazy, Weak, Or Awful

(I’m not going to rehash the entire theory because regular readers would rise up and slay me for repeating myself. If you want the full scoop, click here.)

There are many different yous in your head. William James was saying it back in the 19th century, and now every major division of psychology is on board with this idea, including neuroscience.

From The Body Keeps the Score:

I know what some of you are thinking:

The problem is they’re not always right about what’s best and the goals of Self 1 may conflict with the goals of Self 2. (Paging Tyler Durden. Tyler Durden please come to the front desk.)

IFS therapists refer to the different “yous” as “parts.”

From Self-Therapy:

Through this lens, I see bad habits as an “autoimmune disorder of the mind.” And with that, crazy as it may sound, things actually start to make a lot more sense.

(It might also explain how a blogger’s ex can have both fear of abandonment and fear of intimacy, but that’s a story for another day, Bubba.)

You need to understand what other-you is trying to accomplish and find a better way to address the underlying need so you can both get on the same page.

(To learn more about the science of a successful life, check out my new book here.)

So who are these other selves? When it comes to problematic behaviors, there are three flavors we need to be concerned with…

Exiles, Managers and Firefighters

We all have fears. And we try to cope with those fears. And by “we” I mean the “we” in your head. Allow me to introduce the cast of characters that are causing the “problems”:

Exiles:

Bad stuff happens to us and we take away painful lessons that we don’t let go. And these fears often unconsciously guide our actions in frustrating ways.

Managers:

It thinks if you gave in to the fears of the inner child you’d be paralyzed, so it harasses you endlessly and occasionally steers “you” to behave in ways that aren’t aligned with your goals.

From Internal Family Systems Skills Training Manual:

Managers still see you as an irresponsible child and feel you wouldn’t wear clean underwear if they didn’t remind you 50 times a day.

Firefighters:

From Internal Family Systems Skills Training Manual:

So this dysfunctional family is fighting in your head and your behavior looks like a chaotic mess because you’re not even conscious of the conflicting goals everyone has.

(To learn the seven-step morning ritual that will make you happy all day, click here.)

Alright, Dr. Jekyll, get everyone in the car. We’re going to therapy…

1) Get Calm

Sit down somewhere quiet. Take a few deep breaths. Relax. You want to be chill, centered and accepting.

Why? Because you want to make sure you’re you. Getting emotional is what signals the Manager to start nagging or — even worse– the Firefighters to start whacking at the front door with axes.

Now think about the primary “bad habit” or issue you’re dealing with. Picture the “Manager” behind it:

Is it an overprotective parent that pushes you to work too hard?

Or a slacker that’s always tempting you to procrastinate?

A nagging perfectionist voice that says you’re never smart enough or beautiful enough?

Or a critical voice that tells you not to trust people?

(To learn the 3 secrets from neuroscience that will make you emotionally intelligent, click here.)

Take a second and imagine that voice as a real, full-blown person. Because you’re about to have a conversation with them.

Look, I told you this was going to get weird…

2) Talk To Them… Um, I Mean, You

Yes, you’re going to talk to yourself like you have multiple personalities. Because, well, you do. It’s not quite as odd as you think, really.

Altogether, the current research showed that second-person self-talk strengthens both actual behavior performance and prospective behavioral intentions more than first-person self-talk.

Ask them questions. A few good ones are:

What’s your role in my life?

What are you trying to protect me from?

And the big money question:

What are you afraid would happen if you didn’t do this job anymore?

Accept and acknowledge what they say to you. Don’t get in an argument with yourself (although, from my perspective, that would be really funny.)

(To learn the 4 rituals from neuroscience that will make you happy, click here.)

Did you get permission? Okay, here’s where it gets really interesting. And weird. But interesting…

3) Talk To The Exile

Meet your inner child. Aren’t they adorable? They look like you but smaller and probably scared out of their wits — which is why you’re here.

Ask the kid what they’re afraid of. Inhabit the role. What fear is so powerful that this kid actually has employees running around to protect him?

I’m afraid of failing. Doing the work makes me think about it not turning out well. And then I’ll be a loser and no one will like me.

You don’t need willpower or more self-control or discipline. You need to get to know yourself a little better. So ask. And listen. And you’ll be amazed what you’ll tell yourself.

(To learn the six rituals from ancient wisdom that will make you happy, click here.)

Okay, your time in therapy is up. Let’s do a quick review and find out the best part about talking to Managers, inner children and the rest of the circus in your noggin…

Sum Up

Here’s how to quit bad habits without willpower:

Stay calm and talk to the Manager: Find out why they do what they do by asking… well, you.

Talk to your inner child: I’m cringing that I typed that. But, corny as it sounds, it really does help. Discover your fears. That’s what’s driving your “bad behavior.”

This won’t be quick. It won’t be easy. I have oversimplified the process because some people are already whining that this post is too long. (Whatever. They only read the “Sum Up” anyway.)

From Self-Therapy:

Loving yourself really means loving each of your parts. Befriending yourself means developing a relationship with each of your parts and having them trust you.

Get to know yourself so you can love yourself. All your selves.

Join over 320,000 readers. Get a free weekly update via email here.

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The post This Is How To Quit Bad Habits Without Willpower: 3 Secrets From Neuroscience appeared first on Barking Up The Wrong Tree.

#Happiness

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salzspektrum · 7 years

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A / B (i totally know which one you're choosing here kjgdsj) / L / N / T

Arya Stark: okay so this is probably gonna be long, just like the other ones lol sorry #somebody stop me. she’s hands-down my favorite female got/asoiaf character and most certainly one of the most complex characters of anything ever imo. her entire life she felt alienated, felt like she was ugly and worthless. she didn’t fit in bc she wasn’t what people wanted her to be. she loves her family, even sansa. she misses them and she longs for them, yet she doesn’t dare to dream of seeing them again bc she’s afraid that something bad’s gonna happen (and it happens bc this is got, afterall). arya develops a deep bond with her wolf *casually side-eyes the show writers* and feels like she belongs somewhere. she’s afraid of rejection, she’s a senstive girl with a lot of love in her heart. *side-eyes people who want to paint her as a brutal mass murderer,also side-eyes show writers again* i love all these sides of her character, she is so multi-layered and it makes so much sense for her character. she has dark and bright sides. another thing that i admire and love is her kindness and openmindness (is that a word?). also she’s a fucking feminist. not that kind of “feminist” that says shit like “girls are stupid, girls who like feminine things are stupid” *side-eyes show writers one more time* she admires and respects all kinds of women and befriends people who are lower in class than she is, simply bc she doesn’t care about class. she cares about people. holy shit i guess i’ll stop now before i end up writing a huge essay lol sorry.

Bran Stark: yeAH YOU WERE RIGHT IS ANYONE SURPRISED BY MY CHOICE I KNOW I AM NOT!! (i’ll probably be mixing show and book stuff, sorry in advance) okay so this boy hardly gets any love from the got fandom since the writers love to forget that he’s an actual character and not just a way to show some exposition. also the fandom is hella ableist but let’s not get into the fandom drama, maybe another day. all this boy ever wanted is to become a knight, he dreamed of it. but one day he just happened to be placed into a terrible position and his entire life changed (truly fuck you jaime tbh). being disabled is a challenge, especially for a little boy like bran. honestly before I start writing down his entire arc, i will just name what i love about him: i love his kindness, for the smallfolk, his family, his friends; i love his intelligence and resilience; i love his determination to find the three-eyed raven. i also love how good he did when he was lord of winterfell. he’s in a position now, that he never wanted,a powerful and dangerous one. he still takes responsibility bc he knows that’s the best for the world rn. honestly his chapter in adwd was incredibly dark and sad, i read it and i was getting really sad bc you can really see how much all of this affects him, and now the three-eyed raven wants bran to accept the darkness. he has a deep connection with his wolf and he sees warging summer as some sort of escapism, he can run around and he feels whole. that’s just so sad. yet he’s such a strong character with so much love to give. truly before i start crying, i just wanna say that it’s a fucking shame that the fandom doesn’t appreciate bran for more than just his “cool powers” and the flashbacks. he is a wonderfully complex and interesting character and i hate this shitty ableist annoying fandom bye (wow i got angry REAL quick).

Lito Rodriguez: look;;you know how lovely this dude is.he is just!! so!! for real tho, he is one of my fave characters in sense8 (can’t choose 1 single fave bc nOoO) and I love his arc, how he overcomes some personal issues and learns to accept and love himself as a gay man and be brave enough to state that publicly. just the way he progressed is so beautiful imo. also he is super dramatic so I absolutely #relate to that.

Nyssa al Ghul: okay so she is absolutely badass and beautiful. this amazing lesbian queen will kick your ass if you’re a uglyass gross dude trying to hit on her, she has no time for shit like that. she’s daughter of the demon and should be the rightful heir, if her dad only wasn’t an asshole. she’s also super adorable and enjoys dipping her french fries in a milkshake, even tho it confuses her. she’s everything omg.

Theon Greyjoy: okay so this boy has been through some S H I T. not everyone enjoys him but to me he has one of the most complex story-arcs in the entirety of got/asoiaf. he started out being kinda dickish, yet somehow some of his behavior is understandable since he’s been raised as a ward and therefore as a less important member of the stark household. he didn’t belong with the starks but in the end he realized that they were his true family. and then he gets back home, gets rejected by his father, fucks some shit up and ends up being tortured for several years. the horrors that he goes through are insane and he is changing completely, trauma and all. now, i love this man bc he is incredibly complex and morally grey. he did some fucked up shit but for some of his decisions you can kinda see why he did what he did. he didn’t deserve any of this, he didn’t deserve torture and sexual abuse and he almost gave up on himself and life. almost. i don’t wanna write too much here bc i’m getting emo. just know that this man is a highly intriguing character and his chapters in adwd were my favorite, by far.

Drop five letters of the alphabet in my ask box, and I’ll give my favorite characters whose name starts with those letters.

#holy shit sorry for making this so long #i kinda lost control #you can kinda see for which characters i REALLY feel a lot of love lol #this is a huge mess but meh soz fam :D #long post #...kinda gotta tag it as that lol #sassynygma #asks

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trendingnewsb · 7 years

Text

What Sheryl Sandberg can teach you about loss, grief, and resilience

Image: Ambar del moral / mashable

There’s something comforting about Sheryl Sandberg’s voice on the phone. It’s calm, self-assured, and sweet.

Yet there are also tremors of vulnerability in the Facebook COO’s voice, hints of the grief and longing she has grappled with ever since the sudden death of her husband Dave Goldberg in May 2015.

SEE ALSO: What the words of a dying doctor taught me about life’s meaning

“Living with this is a daily thing,” she says. “There are days I do better and days I do worse. There are days I keep the promises I make to myself to feel grateful, and there are days I don’t. In the better moments, even when I feel grief, I can remember that my kids are still alive. I can remember that Dave would have wanted them to be happy. I can remember how lucky I am to have friends and family. I would never say that those are all the moments, because they’re not.”

Sandberg and I are discussing her new book, part memoir and part operating manual for surviving the hardest moments in our lives. It lays bare some of Sandberg’s most painful experiences, the kind that were no doubt harrowing to relive.

Sheryl Sandberg and her late husband Dave Goldberg.

Image: Sheryl sandberg

I cried a lot reading Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, and Finding Joy. So much that I began marking the margins in ink with small tear drops so I could go back to the most moving passages. There were too many to track.

So perhaps I was inclined to hear humanity in Sandberg’s voice; others say they sense calculation and distance. Here’s my advice: Suspend your skepticism of Sandberg, if only to read Option B. It has essential wisdom on how to treat people who are grieving, on how to find resilience in your darkest moments.

Sandberg likes to talk about kicking “elephants” the things we all know but are too embarrassed to say out of the room. So let’s address the biggest one every review of Option B has to face: Why should you take advice on life’s worst experiences from a billionaire tech executive?

Sandberg has created the Option B community to help people find connections amidst loss and trauma.

Image: optionb.org

Sandberg doesn’t have the soulfulness of Oprah Winfrey, who uses her brand to nudge followers along the path of spiritual enlightenment. Nor is she from Momastery founder Glennon Doyle Melton’s school of being disarmingly honest.

Rightly or wrongly, people have come to expect that level of intimacy when a public figure brands their personal experiences, which is what may have lead to suspicion about Sandberg’s motives.

That wariness isn’t helped by the glaring blindspots on display in her first book, Lean In, a tome on workplace equality that didn’t truly grasp the nature of women’s challenges outside of corporate boardrooms.

Sandberg also happens to help lead the tech company responsible for transforming the way we communicate and get information. When Facebook is hit with complaints about viral fake news influencing elections, or live video gone horribly wrong, the Facebook groups founded by Sandberg, Lean In and now Option B, subtly defend the company. They’re offering a powerful counter-narrative about how the platform helps people make life-changing connections.

In short, Sandberg is a complicated public figure. You’d be right to have reservations about her writing and its ultimate purpose. But none of that skepticism changes what Sandberg and her co-author Adam Grant, the University of Pennsylvania psychologist, have done with Option B. They’ve taken her deeply personal story and pressed it into service. Her account is the book’s workhorse.

It’s the terrible fate that makes you curious enough to read thousands of words about the social science research that just might help you cope with tragedy.

This impulse of hers to share what she’s learned with the hope that it helps others seems to be innate, even irrepressible. It’s earnest and eager, qualities that aren’t cool these days, but ones that are necessary if alleviating suffering becomes part of your life’s mission.

Sandberg and Goldberg at their wedding.

Image: sheryl sandberg

As someone who studies trauma and resilience research closely, I know that people who experience tragedy often yearn to find greater purpose and meaning in what they’ve endured. Still, I was stunned by Sandberg’s willingness to dive headlong into sharing tender emotions and memories so soon after Goldberg’s death.

When I asked her why she took this on in the midst of learning the contours of her own anguish, parenting two young bereaved children, and helping to run Facebook, Sandberg recalled the terrifying confinement of grief.

“[I]t wasnt just this really overwhelming grief, but it was, you know, a real feeling of isolation,” she says. “The easy conversations I used to have with parents when I dropped off my kids at school … felt gone. And people kind of looked at me like I was a deer in headlights. So as much as I was trying to overcome grief, I was also feeling more and more and more alone.”

Thirty days after Goldberg’s death, she turned (of course) to Facebook with the equivalent of a primal scream. “You can give in to the void, the emptiness that fills your heart, your lungs, constricts your ability to think or even breathe,” she wrote. “Or you can try to find meaning.”

Once she saw friends and strangers connecting in the comments and in real life to comfort her and each other, Sandberg realized she could be a conduit. Her suffering could amount to more than private moments of hell. The legacy of Goldberg’s life and death could become invaluable to people struggling with their own pain.

“Really I would give anything to go back and live one day with Dave Goldberg knowing what I know now,” she says. “But I cannot do that, I dont have that choice. If I can just give a little bit of that working with Adam [on the book], that has meaning for me, and I think when you face the abyss of grief, the void, the boot on your chest, you want something positive to come out of it.”

Really I would give anything to go back and live one day with Dave Goldberg knowing what I know now. But I dont have that choice.

So writing Option B became an urgent next step.

Sandberg borrowed the name from a good friend who, in the weeks after Goldberg’s death, lovingly told her: “Option A is not available. So let’s just kick the shit out Option B.”

By marrying anecdote and scientific research, the book provides a pathway for doing just that. Sandberg and Grant explain that resilience isn’t something we come by automatically when we face tragedy. It’s more like a muscle that needs strengthening and conditioning, and they point to practical and proven tools like journaling, gratitude lists, and cognitive behavioral therapy that help reframe how we respond to adversity.

Some may balk at the book’s invocation of positive psychology founder Martin Seligman, whose research on pessimism and optimism is sometimes criticized for focusing on your attitude toward hardship. After all, a positive mindset only goes so far when you’re subjected to chronic societal, institutional, or family trauma, such as police violence, incarceration, and emotional or physical abuse.

Sandberg seems to get that. She peppers the chapters with policy prescriptions that reflect how suffering can take a disproportionate toll because of gender, race, ethnicity, and income, among other factors.

The book is also filled with anecdotes and insights from people of diverse backgrounds who demonstrate the many ways we can respond to heartbreak with resilience.

It’s clear Sandberg has learned from criticism of Lean In, and understood the value of looking far and wide for relatable, realistic perspectives.

SEE ALSO: You use this word to help you through hard times without even knowing it

Option B covers a lot of ground. It moves from advice on how to talk to a grieving person to research on gratitude, self-compassion, and post-traumatic growth to insights about reclaiming joy in the shadow of loss, how to raise resilient children, what resilient communities look like, and why we need more emotionally honest workplaces.

That ambitious scope, however, may be the book’s greatest weakness. It can occasionally feel like a grab bag of observations, scientific findings, and heartfelt stories.

There is relatively little discussion of mental health conditions that you might experience after loss or trauma, like anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress. You won’t find much on talk therapy or courses of medication, strategies that are just as valid in helping to create resilience as writing a gratitude list or allowing yourself to feel small doses of joy, both coping skills that Sandberg recommends.

Sandberg and Goldberg in 2004.

Image: sheryl sandberg

The book closes with an invitation for readers to join the Option B community in order to “connect with others who are coping with challenges like yours.” It should also include that website’s link to its roundup of organizations that support trauma survivors, in addition to the numbers for the National Suicide Prevention Hotline and Crisis Text Line.

This book has the power to help heal, but in doing so, can bring you to the edge of your own fears. Sometimes, no matter how meaningfully meant, words on a page aren’t enough to help us take a step back from that terror.

Still, there is much to praise about Option B‘s emphasis on translating scientific research into advice people can explore and adopt. What’s doubly impressive about Sandberg’s decision to write it: she must have known it required opening herself up to feedback that far exceeds the usual literary criticism.

One writer, for example, lauded the book but argued that Sandberg tackled the problem of grief “almost as if it were a failing business to be turned around.” Expect to hear a lot more of that kind of commentary. It’s an easy criticism to make, and it devalues what Sandberg has accomplished.

We love when Silicon Valley and its ambassadors make our lives more convenient; we’d rather not see the seams of their handiwork. What we want instead, especially from women of Sandberg’s stature, is a never-ending well of authenticity.

When women become technical, wonky or dispassionate, (ahem, Hillary Clinton), we seem to have less use for them. Suddenly they are suspect. But consider how we were willing to forgive Steve Jobs, who was so famously unfeeling that he invariably parked his car in Apple’s disabled spots, and then elevate him as a cultural icon and genius.

When I ask Sandberg about skepticism of her efforts, she deflects for a bit. She talks about the success of the Lean In movement and the tough lessons she learned from that book, then lands on the anecdote she wants to share.

A friend’s child who is quite sick has recently spent a lot of time on Option B reading people’s stories and realizing he doesn’t have to feel isolated.

If that child,” she says, “… if he felt less alone because weve helped build something that helped connect him to people not everyone has to love it, but I would make that decision every day.

That’s good enough for me. I hope it’s good enough for you too.

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