In Sanity: A piece of mind: Recent Episodes
Stephanie Snuffer
Join me this week as Regan and I discuss two of her emotional myths. This is a wonderful entry into a new series I will be doing. I asked my kids and their spouses/partners if they would each choose an emotional myth, either from the list or one of their own, and then discuss it on the podcast. They agreed, and Regan was available for the first one.
I am excited to hear from so many diverse voices about their experiences with emotions and what they see as myths they carry with them. This series will not be consecutive, and I will return to DBT distress tolerance skills in the next couple of weeks.
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There is a lot of noise in the background, including sweet newborn baby cries. We are lucky enough to have a baby in our house and talk about positive emotions. It's beautiful, and I am relishing the positive feelings of loving on a newborn.
This week's podcast builds on positive experiences by introducing mood momentum, attending to relationships, and acting the opposite to increase positive emotions.
Being human requires skills, which I am finding DBT provides. Continue on this journey with me, and check out the show notes for handouts and worksheets to help support you.
Myths about Emotions
Pleasant Activities List
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One of the key concepts in DBT is the focus on building positive experiences, which is a component of the emotion regulation module. Building positive experiences in the short term and the long term is aimed at increasing positive events, which can help improve mood and counteract negative emotional states.
In this podcast, I will discuss how to intentionally engage in enjoyable or fulfilling activities. This will increase positive emotions. This creates a CBT triangle cycle where emotions, feelings, and behaviors influence and affect each other positively.
By building positive experiences, we can develop a better sense of self and a more fulfilling life.
Accumulating Positive Experiences
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Emotional regulation is the ability to manage our emotions in a healthy way. It's about being able to identify and understand our emotions, and then being able to respond to them in a way that is helpful to us and to others.
But sometimes, there are barriers that can make it difficult to regulate our emotions. These barriers can be physical, such as chronic pain or illness, or they can be cognitive, such as negative thinking patterns or low self-esteem.
In this podcast, we'll explore the different physical and cognitive barriers to emotional regulation. We'll talk about how these barriers can affect our lives, and I'll give some strategies for overcoming them.
So, if you're struggling to regulate your emotions, you're not alone. By understanding the barriers to emotional regulation, we can take steps to overcome them and live healthier, happier lives. There is hope.
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Emotions are necessary for survival. They keep us safe, connect us with other people, help us access memories, cope with situations that affect us on a daily basis, avoid pain, and seek pleasure. That's a lot. We should respect them more, do more to understand them, and experience more healthy expression of our emotions.
This week's podcast provides more information, along with examples to support that goal. Let me know what you think.
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I am on a mission to guide you into increased emotional awareness. I am using DBT resources, books, and my personal experiences to encourage you on your journey of self-discovery. I am learning new things about myself each week. Come along and share in the expanding of our souls.
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Join me on this week's podcast to learn how emotions improve our lives and help us reflect the Divine. If we strive for wholeness and health, emotions are necessary to find that. Emotionally healthy people also enjoy benefits in other areas, such as work, parenting, relationships, spirituality, resilience, etc.
Recognizing Your Emotions
Emotion Regulation Worksheet
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Most of us go through the day experiencing a range of emotions—from pleasant to unpleasant, some of which are in our awareness and others are out of our awareness. We all have an emotion dashboard of sorts. This dashboard relays information that we use to make decisions. Sometimes the emotions that happen outside of our awareness can cause us to make poor decisions, say things we regret, or take actions that cause us or others harm. It is important to learn to read the signals of our dashboards. Listen to this podcast to learn this and other important facts about emotional intelligence and health.
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I've spent the last few weeks thinking about these skills and decided to dig deeper and provide more context and information. I also provided some examples in hopes you will see how to more effectively use these skills in your relationships.
Check the below for some worksheets.
DBT Fast Skills
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Emotions are signals within your body that tell you what’s happening and what you are experiencing in any given moment. When something pleasurable happens to you, you feel good; when something distressing happens to you, you feel bad. Frequently your emotions are like an instant news service that gives you constant updates about what you’re doing and what you’re experiencing.
This week's podcast discusses emotional intelligence, emotional health, and the distinction between the two. Intelligence requires skill building, and health is a state of being. Both are necessary emotional regulation.
Feelings Buried Alive Never Die
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This week's podcast describes the skills to use when you are asking for something, saying no to another's request, resisting pressure, and maintaining your point of view. The skills used are describing, expressing, asserting, reinforcing, (staying) mindful, appearing confident, and negotiating. Use the words DEAR MAN to remember these skills. Check out the show notes below for some worksheets.
Therapist Aid DBT worksheets
DBT Worksheet
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The goal of the GIVE skill is to build and keep healthy relationships. These skills are "other" focused and are a gift you are giving someone. This podcast also has some more information on validation - what it is and what it is not, how to use it effectively in GIVE and why it is a necessary skill to have.
DBT Skills - Reproducible Materials
Give Skills
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FAST skills focus on self-respect. Using values, goals, and priorities, we are making choices that increase the respect we have for ourselves. This is important because it is a solid base for building and maintaining all our relationships.
Use the acronym FAST to remember the building blocks (Fair, Apologies not needed, Stick to values,Truth and accountability) of this skill.
DBT Fast Skills
DBT FAST
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Join me this week as I continue the discussion around interpersonal skills through the DBT framework of knowledge and practice. There is so much information and this week I did a good job of using real life examples. DBT is a therapy that focuses on improving self so we can improve our relationships. We need that. Please be thoughtful and intentional with the information in this week's podcast. It lays the groundwork for next week where I will breakdown the guidelines to use to accomplish the things I talk about tihs week.
Interpersonal Objectives Handouts
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Join Lindsay and I this week as we work through a DBT session using the mindfulness worksheets. She describes the ways she used the worksheets and we have a nice conversation regarding ways our resistance to practicing mindfulness is overcome using the DBT process.
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Interpersonal effectiveness skills help you build new relationships, strengthen current ones, and deal with conflict situations. They allow you to effectively ask for what you want and refuse or say NO to unwanted requests. They are the behaviors and actions needed to communicate assertively, set boundaries, resolve conflicts, and deepen relationships. They are helpful in families, workplaces, with friends, and even strangers. Skills are the magic, and it just happens that M. Linehan put this magic together for us.
So ... let's use them.
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Join me this week and enjoy a conversation with me, Kylee and Carson as we talk about our views on unsolicited advice. Carson helps us consider the distinction between opinion and advice. Perhaps we think we are giving advice, but it is really an opinion - so how do we know? Good things to think about. Kylee offers up her thoughts that unsolicited advice giving is not and has never been the problem. The problem is the giving and the receiving with our ego. Listen this week and let me know your thoughts.
We also discuss the difference between opinion and advice. Carson h
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As promised, here are some "how(s)" of a mindfulness practice. First, you are going to practice nonjudgment. Then you are going to work on being one-minded. Lastly, you will find ways to be effective and practice effectively. I challenge you to not only listen, but grab yourself an accountability buddy and start practicing these today. Call your mom, check in with your partner and make the practice of mindfulness a priority. You won't regret it. I promise.
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Mindfulness is a critical part of DBT. There are three core skills which include Wise Mind, "what" skills (what you do when practicing mindfulness - observing, describing, and participating) and "how" skills (how you practice when practicing mindfulness - nonjudgmentally, one-mindfully, effectively). Listen to this week's podcast for explanations and examples on how to practice your "what" skills.
Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience
Way of the Peaceful Warrior
Episode 94 - Microanxieties: What can you fix in 5 minutes
Episode 101 - Play Your Way to Wellness & Giveaway Week
Episode 102 - All Work and No Play & the Giveaway Winners
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Mindfulness is a critical part of DB skills. Without it, it is difficult to change the long-standing patterns of thinking, feeling and acting that are not serving us.
Among other things, mindfulness is the key to emotional regulation and to successfully resolving interpersonal conflicts.
Learning how to be mindful isn’t complicated, but it is a commitment. Listen to this week's podcast to deepen your understanding of this important practice.
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There are reasons we do what we do, and there are reasons we don't do what we don't do. This is where analyzing the missing links in our chain analysis helps us. Why did we not do something that would have avoided the problem behavior? Why don't we do things to decrease our vulnerabilities? Listen to this podcast for answers to these questions and more. Check out the link below for worksheets to do your own analyzing of behavior and finding your missing links.
DBT Worksheets to work on behavior analysis and missing link analysis. Let me know what you think?
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There is always an underlying cause for a certain feeling or behavior, and it is important to figure out what that cause is. When we engage in unhelpful or problematic behaviors, we do it for a reason. The maladaptive behavior serves some kind of function that is important to us. However, there are usually unpleasant consequences associated with that problem behavior.
Chain analysis is a process that can help people better understand why certain behaviors happen. Do you want to know why you avoid your mother's phone call? Do you drink more than you think is good for you? Why do you yell at your children? Why do you take unnecessary risks?
Listen to this week's podcast to learn some steps in analyzing YOUR behavior. What happens to cause you to act that way? What are all the events that precede the behavior? What makes you vulnerable to behaving this way? What are the consequences?
Chain analysis can help.
email: apieceofmindpodcast@gmail.com
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I am taking a pause this week on DBT and having a conversation with a few of my kids about spirituality and mental health. We discuss different perspectives and have different ideas about how mental health practices can impact a person's spirituality. However, we all believe that practicing therapy, going to therapy, and doing work on the self are spiritual practices with the potential to bring a person to healing and to God.
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Join me this week as we move away from DBT as a mental health therapy and discuss incorporating the skills into everyday living. The more you know about mindfulness, interpersonal personal effectiveness, emotion regulation, and distress tolerance, the better you can relate to other people. Win-win!
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Welcome to 2024. Thanks for being here and joining me for another season and another year. This week is an introduction to a cognitive behavior therapy called Dialectical Behavior Therapy. Dialectic means to combine opposite ideas. For example, "I am scared, but I am going to do it anyway." DBT is a skills-based talk therapy created by Marsha Linehan.
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This being Christmas day, I thought I would tell you my favorite Christmas story from the scriptures. I hope you enjoy and maybe gain a new perspective. Happy holidays and Merry Christmas to you all.
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Instead of telling you how to use boundaries to keep people out, this podcast will help you see why, if you can, you should let people in. This podcast is an introduction to the idea of getting to know someone else's story and sharing your story with them. The vulnerability necessary for meaningful human connection can be scary, but it's a journey worth pursuing.
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This podcast includes a refresher on boundaries using the Three Circles Communication Tool, more information on states and stories and ways to reflect on these concepts during the holiday season.
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Neuroception is the process by which we assess our world for cues of safety or danger. It is an unconscious process that affects the biology of our autonomic nervous system. Once our body interprets the signals, we hear and see things differently depending on our autonomic state. Listen to this week's podcast to learn how our stories are created in our nervous system states and not the other way around.
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Come on a brief journey with me as I spend some time showing you all how to map your nervous system. What better way to do that than to use the experiences we have during the holiday season. Joy, peace, stress, anxiety, hopelessness, and dissociation are all words to describe our nervous system states; respectively, ventral vagal (socially engaged), sympathetic (fight or flight) and dorsal vagal or parasympathetic (freeze).
Using my Thanksgiving experience, I show how becoming aware of our vagal states provides us a wealth of information to regulate our emotions and track our autonomic states during the joys and stresses of the holiday season.
Let me know what you think.
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Join me this week as Denver and I talk about his experiences with what is most certainly neuroception and perception. It's deep and its wide and much like all mental health concepts, I could go on and on. Let me know your takeaways, and what else you'd like to know.
The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals that Protect us from Violence
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This podcasts continues the discussion about your nervous system, the vagus nerve and the theory of polyvagal. I am still pontificating about the miracle of the human body and its systems. I am eager for you all to understand this, and find value in it much the same way you find value in attachment, values, boundaries and parenting.
Here is the book I refer to
The Polyvagal Theory in Therapy: Engaging the Rhythm of Regulation
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There are two main branches of the nervous system; the sympathetic and parasympathetic. It responds to signals and sensations via three pathways and each has a different pattern of response.
The autonomic nervous system utilizes three pathways for feedback to respond to sensations in the body and signals from the environment. The autonomic nervous system is the bedrock for our lived experiences.
Stay tuned for more in the next few weeks.
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The theory of the triune brain has been debunked with the new research showing that the brain is much more integrated that Paul MacLean's 1960s theory. However, it is useful in understanding the different functions of the brain and where in the brain they take place. Next week I will talk about some of the newer research and what overlaps and what is distinct.
Also, Iain McGilchrist wrote the book The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World which was the book I was referring to which talks about the integration of the different brain parts. Note: I have not finished this book.
Dan Seigel: Hand Model of the Brain
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In this episode I talk about how precision of language can help reduce the way we use the adjective "good" to describe people and their behavior. Also, this language can help support highlighting any type of behavior by being a curious, like a detective, to find out how certain behaviors are working in the lives of our loved ones. Maybe sacrifice works great for one husband, but the other one gets taken advantage of. What if sharing is great for one child because he only shares the toys he wants to share, but is terrible for the other child because favorite toys get broken. Good behaviors gone bad.
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Before I found C. Jung's quote, which you will hear at the end of this podcast, I had polled my family about the ideas of wholeness and goodness. Much like last week, I am brain dumping some deep and important thoughts on the perils of good and right. I brush up against some Internal Family Systems Therapy in an effort to identify the ways we lose parts of ourselves to needing to be "good" and add some insight into how our tribes, groups, communities, and religions perpetuate this ethos.
Leave me some comments at apieceofmindpodcast@gmail.com
Or join the conversation on Instagram @in_sanitypodcast
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Let's start this journey down the rabbit hole of "good" and "right". This podcast drops two or three things for you to consider about how the concept of good and right might show up in your relationships. Parenting, partnerships, friendships or employment - we live with the idea that being a good friend, or a right parent means something about us. Well, you are right, it does mean something, but not what you think. So, listen up and let's bring the unconscious into the conscious and see how these ideas are impacting our lives.
What are your thoughts?
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I want to provide as much information as possible to help you guys in your parenting journey. I also want my listeners to understand that when I am talking about parenting, I am talking about relationships. In this podcast, you will hear some new things and some old things about mindfulness, attachment, and healthy parenting.
Parenting from the Inside Out: How a Deeper Self-Understanding Can Help You Raise Children Who Thrive
Dan Siegel and Mary Hartzell
The Mindfulness Solution : Everyday Practices for Everyday Problems
Ronald Siegel
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Why do we yell? It's because our kids are making us crazy, pushing our buttons, making our life stressful, right? Well, no. It's a kids job to push our buttons, and test our limits. We control our emotions because that's our job. It's our responsibility to react in a way that is good for everybody. Parenting is hard, and it is important to mindfully attend to our triggers, when we feel overwhelmed, powerless, afraid, etc. so we can keep ourselves from "flipping our lids." Listen to this podcast to learn why we yell, and what we can do to stop.
Why Parents Yell at Their Children and How to Stop the Cycle of Trauma by Rebecca Lyddon (June 2022)
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Most of us live mindlessly. This is a natural adaptation to the demands of our daily lives. We are distracted from the moment we get up til the moment we go to bed. Our minds are always whirling with deadlines, errands, people, and thoughts we have about it all. Additionally, we are almost always multitasking. We have our music on while driving, checking our emails while on the phone, cooking while trying to clean up and have a conversation. Our attention is rarely focused on just one thing at a time, which makes it impossible to be fully immersed in all of the things we are doing. Mindfulness is slowing down some of what we are doing and focusing on one thing at a time. While it is very difficult to be fully present every waking moment, we can work to cultivate some more mindfulness in some small moments of our day. With practice, these small moments of mindfulness can carry over into the rest of our lives, and help us to be more present in our days.
Tell me about your mindfulness practice . . .
O - observation
F - feeling/emotions
N - need
R - request
S - stop/pause
T - thoughts
O - observe sensations/physical
P - proceed with awareness
H - are you Hungry
A - are you Angry
L - are you Lonely
T - are you Tired
Plain and Simple: A Woman's Journey to the Amish
The Mindfulness Solution : Everyday Practices for Everyday Problems
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This week I am joined by Lindsay and Kylee to talk about honesty, vulnerability, bravery and how to be a truth-teller. Being honest in our relationships is surprisingly difficult, and we find other ways to maintain the status quo, especially if everything is "fine." I think we have an obligation and a duty to be kind, compassionate, graceful truth-tellers. This is how we refine and improve and how we build trust in our relationships. Lindsay and Kylee give examples of how truth-telling, giving and accepting feedback or not have been positively and negatively experienced in their lives. It's a great podcast and I love having them as guests.
What does it mean to be brave? Kylee joins me this week to talk about how to be authentic and true to yourself. You are not for everybody, and you don't need to be. What does that mean? What ways can you be brave?
Be Brave Little One
57 Modern Manners for Today's Teens
Self-compassion is a skill and it needs to be practiced. If you don't know the benefits of self-compassion it's hard to commit time or energy in your day for this practice, especially if you are care taking or parenting. Don't worry, take a deep breath, notice your emotions, defuse from your thoughts, give yourself a hug, say a kind word to yourself and you are practicing self-compassion.
This work will pay dividends. I promise - Oh, and buy this book.
Mindful Self-Compassion
The inner critic, and we all have one, has a huge impact over our inner life. It affects our overall well-being. Originally, its function was to protect us from danger. Now it's more or less a maladaptive behavior with a lot of negative consequences. This exercise helps us reduce its negative affect by showing it some appreciation and understanding. Give it a try and let me know what you think.
Exercises for quieting your inner critic
This podcast is about self-compassion. It is about taming your inner critic through emotional awareness, mindfulness and an increased understanding of your self-critical parts. Self-compassion is the act of being kind to yourself. It requires you to accept yourself exactly as you are - imperfections and all. Self-compassion is not weakness, apathy or giving up. Instead, it's understanding your strengths and weaknesses as part of a work in progress.
The Mindful Self-Compassion Workbook: A Proven Way to Accept Yourself, Build Inner Strength, and Thrive
This episode uses the same resources I used last week to discuss emotional connection with our kids. This week, I wanted to make the case that these same skills can be used in all our relationships for our betterment. However, there is a catch; in our adult relationships, we do this work because it makes us good people. If we do it to assert influence, control or persuasion, we miss the point. Listen, let me know what you think.
It's been hard for me to address the issue of influence and the interplay and/or necessity of the emotional connection. I have not known how to identify what "emotional connection" looks like. Using Brad Reedy's "The Journey of the Heroic Parent" - again, and Karen Young's article (linked below), I finally did it. This podcast supports all the effort I made in the previous few podcasts, and gratefully other people have done most of the work. I put it together in this form, and you are the beneficiary. I hope it is valuable.
Please let me know your thoughts, and thank you for being here!
How to To Build Influence With Kids and Teens Through Emotional Connection
The Journey of the Heroic Parent: Your Child's Struggle & The Road Home
I think more can be said on these two types of parenting. This week, I am not using "The Journey of the Heroic Parent" but that book is at the heart of why I am doing this topic at all. So please -- read it! This week I am doing a bit more break down of types of parental/relationship control, why we tend to use it. Kids behave in certain ways, parents react to that behavior. It's hard being a parent and it's hard to slow down our reactions. First, we need realize that our kids are not US. We are not raising people who feel, think or behave the same way we did or do. There might be similarities, but they still need to be treated like humans who will grow into their own personhood. If you can believe that, then you can move away from controlling parental behaviors. Listen this week and I will discuss behavioral control and touch on psychological control.
Teaching by example, listening to them, including kids in decision making and solutions, and creating opportunities for them to experience age appropriate autonomy are ways to influence your children. Influence has longer staying power than control and is much harder to engage in. It requires self-awareness and some honesty about your parenting motives. Listen to this week's podcast for a toe dip into this topic. Remember I am using "The Journey of the Heroic Parent" as a guide for these episodes. Please read this book!
At least let's start talking about the different between control and influence in our relationships. Specifically, in our parent-child relationships, and more generally, other relationships. I believe control is outcome based and our need to control exists because we need a certain results from our children or our relationships in order to feel "good about ourselves." Detaching from the outcome is an important part of upping our game in relationships, and creating differentiation. This week I use the book The Journey of the Heroic Parent: Your Child's Struggle and the Road Home by Brad Reedy, Phd to start this topic. Please, please read this book!! And let's talk about it.
Leave comments and questions at apieceofmindpodcast@gmail.com and let's have a conversation.
This podcast is a continuation of last week. I focus on two of the admonitions given to parents by Lindsay and Carson.
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Don't make your child's behavior about you. Lindsay reminds us that it is NOT. ABOUT. YOU (the parent).
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Find ways to connect with your children now as who they ARE currently, and don't rely on who they WERE. It's time for new things.
Please engage with this podcast. I really need your questions in order to help clarify the important topics. You can reach out via Instagram, email and comments on the Spotify podcast site.
This week Lindsay and Carson join me this week to discuss adult child/parent relationships. It has become increasingly obvious to me that this is an overlooked area of relationships, and there is a reasonable belief that status quo is fine. Interestingly, I have adult clients who don’t believe the status quo is fine. They express hurt and frustration about their relationships with their parents. However, they also don’t say anything to their parents. I can understand this. It can be very scary. Sometimes those growing pains are too much. Lindsay and Carson have some good insight into how we as parents can do something different. It’s worth a listen.
This week, I respond to the feedback I received from you guys about the 3 circles. Topics brought up include how to teach it to kids, the many different types of conflict, or contention, or disagreement. Also, what is the role of persuasion in the 3 circles. Maybe this will be the last one of these for a while.
Join me this week for a conversation with Emma. This episode is informative in so many ways. Emma's practical experience with this tool, and her ability to address the nuances of this new way of being in relationship with an other is a wonderful way to end this series. Emma was a great guest; it felt like talking to a friend about a topic we are both passionate about.
The framework for The 3 Circles Communication Tool has been laid with the last part being the "Other's Circle." With this basic understanding, you can start to pay attention to how you might use this in your relationships. Next week Emma Reedy will join me to share her insights, feedback and discuss real world application. Don't miss it!!
The Three Circles Communication Tool
The 3 Circles Communication Tool has great potential for improving our relationships. It's about boundaries, communication, validation and intimacy. Please listen, let me know what you think and if you need more clarification.
The Three Circles Communication Tool by Emma Reedy
The Three Circles exercise illustrates a way to use healthy communication in any relationship. This particular tool helps clarify boundaries, and identify people-pleasing and co-dependent behaviors. It also pinpoints the ways parents make their kids responsible for their feelings, how people shut down and shame others for their feelings and experiences, and gives permission to disengage with people who lack respect for their boundaries or what they value.
I will probably spend at least 3 weeks on this topic because I believe it is the foundation for improving ALL our relationships.
Three Circles Communication Tool
Your body is hard-wired to react to stress in ways meant to protect you against threats from predators and other aggressors. Such threats are rare today, but that doesn't mean that life is free of stress. Actually, you probably face a whole lot of stress such as taking on more work than you can handle, bills, family and major transitions. Your brain/body sees these so-called minor hassles as threats. As a result, you may feel as if you're constantly under attack. But you can fight back. You don't have to let stress control your life.
It's been a very busy week celebrating some important people in my family. This has prompted some thoughts on the significance of adult sibling relationships as well as the relationships between adult children and parents.
Please, please listen to this podcast. This is sensory processing sensitivity in real life. Regan is a great guest, and has a lot of insight worth listening to. We talk about how the characteristics depth of processing, overstimulation, emotion reactivity and empathy, and sensitivity to subtleties show up in her everyday life. She is honest and open about the good and bad that comes with this trait. I really appreciate her being willing. I really believe the information in this podcast is worth knowing, and worth sharing.
Sensory Processing Sensitivity (SPS) is a biological trait characterized by greater reactivity to environmental and social stimuli, both positive and negative. The HSP shows a depth of processing, they are often overstimulated and they have intense emotions and increased empathy. They are also more sensitive to things that would go unnoticed by non-sensitive people. These may include food textures, clothing, noise, smells, and any other environmental conditions. This is not a disorder, and it is not an excuse to avoid hard or difficult things.
Listen to this week's podcast to learn more about this trait that affects 20% (at least) of the population.
A highly sensitive person is someone who experiences physical, emotional and mental responses to stimuli in a way that is more extreme than other people. Fifteen to 20% of the population has Sensory-Processing Sensitivity, the term Elaine Aron coined to identify people with this trait. Listen to this week's podcast for insights into how the HSP interacts in or reacts to a world that is more suited to the other 80% of the population.
Finding strength in sensitivity
The Highly Sensitive Person
A mindfulness practice often begins with a breath practice. This is where you focus, sometimes count, your in-breath and out-breath. Your mind may wander and you just bring your focus back to the breath. As you grow more confident in this practice, you can include noticing your thoughts and how they affect you. This practice is done by observing and not getting caught up in the past or the future threads of any of your thoughts. These simple practices and the others I've described in previous podcasts are important ways to build a practice. Change your brain - change your life.
Life is difficult. Why? Why does my brain want to spend so much time generating emotional suffering? Why am I so reactive to stressful situations? Why am I always upset when this happens? What am I supposed to do with these feelings of guilt, shame, boredom, or stress? What about addictions, depression, or chronic pain? Why can't I remember anything? Mindfulness addresses all of these questions. Tuning into our moment-by-moment experiences gives us insight into why and how our minds create senseless suffering. Listen to this week's podcast to get the scoop on my mindfulness practice and how it has positively changed my brain. It will work for you too!
The Mindfulness Solution : Everyday Practices for Everyday Problems
Ronald D. Siegel, PsyD
This podcast is about emotional intelligence. This podcast addresses how as parents and caregivers and spouses and siblings and friends we can do the work of understanding our emotions in order to create a better emotional climate in our relationships. I use the words "bad and good" at one point to say something is "bad" parenting, and I would like to rescind that statement. It was a harsh and judgmental word that came out of a passion for the topic. Parenting is hard. Relationships are hard. Teaching is hard. Therapy is hard. Dealing with our own emotions and the emotions of people around us is hard. Let's do the intentional work and normalize emotional experiences so that everybody feels safe feeling and expressing those feelings.
Join the conversation - email: apieceofmind@gmail.com; IG in_sanitypodcast or Spotify
Epigenetics is the study of the chemical changes in the cells that alter gene expression by turning a gene "on or off." Epigenetics does not alter the DNA strand or the genetic code. This burgeoning area of research has implications for mental health and generational trauma. Most people agree that environment and behavior play a significant role in our physical and mental health, but can we change our gene expression to reverse certain negative outcomes? Listen to this episode for a shallow dive into epigenetics and how this subject relates to generational trauma.
This is the last episode on generational trauma. If you feel like I have missed something, please let me know. You can message me at the In Sanity Instagram account or email me with questions or comments at:
apieceofmindpodcast@gmail.com
What is Epigenetics?
Jean Decety and Jason Cowell give us the following 3 part definition of empathy. 1. Emotional sharing: experiencing the same feelings as others simply by observing them 2. Empathic concern: the desire or motivation to care for individuals in need 3. Perspective-taking: the ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes
Additionally, practicing empathy would include creating a positive outcome in a given situation. Now, this definition goes a bit beyond the scope of this podcast but will be important in the future. For this week's podcast, understanding the concepts of "emotional literacy," "feeling with others," and "tuning in to feelings" will be important.
UnSelfie: Why Empathetic Kids Succeed in Our All-About-Me World
If you are experiencing generational trauma, or if you have experienced your own trauma(s), it is important to find help and support. Often this can be a friend or a family member, and sometimes professional help in the form of support groups, or individual therapy is necessary. Listen to this week's podcast where I talk about genograms, adverse childhood experiences, and mindfulness all in the context of healing generational trauma.
Therapist Aid Genogram
Support Groups
At the end of last week's episode, I briefly mentioned the idea that boys and girls experience prenatal and postnatal parental stress differently. A listener reached out and asked about that. I embarked on the task of researching this. I did not find much, but what I did find was interesting and worth talking about. I hope it is meaningful to you, and that you can make some sense of it. Men and women experience post-traumatic stress disorder and potential traumatic encounters differently. Diagnostic criteria, types of trauma, and coping strategies are unique in men and women. Listen to this week's podcast for some insight into the new research that explains how and why this is the case. Below are a couple of articles for your reference.
How Does Trauma Discriminate Between Men and Women?
Why Men and Women May Respond Differently to Psychological Trauma?
Natural disasters, systemic exploitation, poverty, and war are traumatic experiences that are passed down as inherited trauma. Additionally, maternal stress, emotionally absent parents, attachment wounds, and adverse childhood experiences are generational trauma. This week's podcast expands on the circumstances and situations that can be considered generational trauma and touches on the definition and explanation of epigenetics. The research continues on these important topics.
What is Generational Trauma
What Is Genetic Trauma?
Generational trauma is trauma that can be experienced by more than one person, passed down from grandmother to grandson, or father to daughter. Often it is silent and lacks definition or detail. It can be implied or taught. The symptoms include anxiety, depression, substance use, or PTSD. Listen to this week's podcast and begin the journey of understanding historical trauma, generational trauma, epigenetics, and their role in the lives of both adults and children.
The Legacy of Trauma
Empathy is not something we "have or don't have" by a certain age. Empathy is somewhat of a work in progress - certainly through childhood and adolescence, but oftentimes even into adulthood. Most people are born with the capacity for empathy, but it is something that needs to be experienced, taught, practiced, and cultivated. Listen to this week's podcast where I discuss empathy using Michelle Borba's book Unselfie. It's a good podcast and a better book.
UnSelfie: Why Empathetic Kids Succeed in Our All-About-Me World
In this episode, I talk about perspective, tolerance, valid realities, conflict, abuse, and doing your own work. There are innumerable variables at play in any relationship, and it is difficult to talk specifically about interpretations of conflict and abuse. There are some behaviors that are universally understood to be abusive, and there are many others that are not. Listen to this week's podcast for some information that will enable you to make your own decisions.
How Do You Know If You Should Stay or Go?
5 Signs A Broken Relationship Is Still Worth Saving
Conflict or abuse? That's a big question and one that should be taken seriously. However, barring universally understood abusive behaviors, there is a lot of wiggle room for people to decide for themselves. Not everyone has the same level of tolerance for conflict in their relationships. What one may consider manageable, another may find insufferable. I've decided to break this topic into two parts and discuss the concept of conflict this week, and abuse next week. At that point, it is my hope that each person will have their own understanding of what are acceptable vs. unacceptable behaviors in their relationships.
A question from the Instagram "ask me anything" was about moving on from a therapist, coach, or counselor who is no longer serving your best interests. This week I answer that question using advice and insight from therapists. Ending relationships - your stylist, your dentist, even your dog groomer - can be tricky. There are some important do's and don'ts. It's hard to manage the emotions and anxiety around this potentially difficult step. We don't want to hurt feelings, we may not be happy about the prospect of finding someone new. Listen to this week's podcast to understand this phenomenon and learn some tips.
Giveaway winners are announced on the podcast and will be announced on Instagram this week. Thanks for participating with comments, goals, and reviews. I am definitely going to do this again. Listen to this week's podcast to hear me talk about play for another 25 minutes. This is important stuff and I am bad at it. I hope you are incorporating more unstructured time into your week. I have some more ideas for play at home and at work on the podcast this week.
Play and having fun are scientifically shown to improve mental health. Kids do this easily. Adults, not so much. Listen to this week's podcast for information about why and how play can benefit your mental well-being. Also, this week is GIVEAWAY week. Listen and win.
Prizes:
$25 Amazon gift card
$25 Uncommon Goods gift card
Annie Chen's Attachment Workbook
If you use Instagram, comment on the post with your mental health goals for 2023 and what prize you want and you will be entered for 1 entry.
If you use Instagram, share a favorite post or reel to your story and tag @in_sanitypodcast and you will be entered for 10 entries.
If you rate or review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Castbox you will be entered for 20 entries.
Articles referenced in this week's podcast.
Awakening the Playful Self
The Importance of Play for Adults
Join me this week for some reflection on what my first 100 episodes mean to me. What are the top favorites? Which ones get the fewest listens? What are my favorites, and do I listen to my own podcasts? I have also learned some things about myself and I share those with you this week. In celebration of the first 100, join me next week for a listener giveaway. I will share the details in episode 101.
On this podcast, I spend a few minutes talking about my perspective on Christmas. Like many of you, I found it essential to figure out how to manage my expectations, and the expectations I thought my family had about Christmas. It's taken some years, but I realized I could do Christmas however I want, and people around me will adjust. I can also carry Christmas and the holiday season into the new year. This gives me more time to engage in meaningful things after Christmas and throughout the year.
When your attachment style triggers a reaction, it's essential to recognize it. These reactions are felt in your body - sweaty palms, racing heart, clenched teeth, tight chest, and tense muscles just to name a few. These are signals to pay attention to and associate them with your emotional reactions to stress in your relationship with your partner and the associated attachments. That's a mouthful, but that's the awareness component. Acceptance is how well you can tolerate yourself and your significant other; no judgment and a lot of self-compassion. You are good and loveable and worthy just the way you are. Next is communication and how you communicate. There are strategies and it's a good idea to create some ground rules for discussing your emotionally charged topics - which could be anything, by the way. Check out some attachment websites and get Annie Chen's book. See prior show notes for links.
Avoidant attachment is an insecure attachment. The belief is that others are unreliable, so they have to meet their own needs. This translates into romantic partners who are self-protective and stressed out if there is too much need in a relationship. Listen to this week's podcast to learn what a relationship with insecure-avoidant partners will look like.
Avoidant adults are often independent and self-reliant. They appear happy and go-lucky. They problem-solve, avoid conflict, and rarely need emotional support or help from anybody. They pursue excellence outside of their relationships and appear "in control." Relationships for insecurely attached avoidant people are best left superficial. Emotional closeness and intimacy are eschewed, even in a romantic, committed relationship. If a partner wants too much, the avoidant partner - avoids. Competing attachments, fault-finding, and emotional stonewalling are all ways avoidant partner creates separation. Listen to this week's podcast to determine whether you have avoidant tendencies. Remember, this is a spectrum. No one definition hits all the relevant points.
The Attachment Project
The Attachment Theory Workbook
The Attachment Quiz
Join me this week for the second and last episode regarding competing attachments. What are yours and how do you use them to avoid different aspects of your romantic relationships? Can you communicate with your partner about these issues? Do you want a secure, satisfying romantic relationship? Then do the work.
Identifying and addressing competing attachments with couples
Primary Relationships should be a Primary Priority
Join Kylee and me this week as she brings up the subject of "micro-anxieties." These things annoy you and you waste emotional energy caring about them. They are a brain drain, and not worth the space they take. There is science behind the idea that this stuff stifles creativity, decreases productivity, and makes you miserable.
The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing
Atomic Habits
A competing or rival attachment is something or someone we turn to instead of our partners. This week's podcast talks about this issue and identifies some rival attachments, and then challenges you to see what or who you might be investing in to get one or more of your emotional needs met. Our attachment styles impact how we connect in our romantic relationships, and this week's podcast can help bring awareness to these counterfeit attachments and the impact they have on us and our partners.
Yes, you can hear a cat meowing through the entire episode. Remember, I told you all about the animals. Apparently, he was hungry, lonely, and talkative. Ender and I are finished talking about anxious attachment insecure style. This week's podcast is about communication, safety, security, empathy, and appreciation. Listen to the podcast for some final thoughts about this important topic.
This week's podcast discusses the important ideas of acceptance and self-compassion towards the anxiously attached. These practices open space for new neural pathways to be created and in turn new behaviors to be engaged in. Listen to this week's podcast to see what this looks like. It's not easy, but it is worth it.
Fear and rejection are at the heart of those with anxious attachment styles. Any perceived threat to the relationship is devastating. The anxiously attached person appears to focus on these perceived threats as a way to manage their fear of abandonment. The anxious attacher is often angry, negative and self-critical to cope with their greatest fears in relationships. It can be hard to connect with these behaviors. This week, I talk about this facet of attachment in relationships.
What's Your Attachment Style - Debbi Carberry Blog
The Attachment Project
Annie Chen, Attachment Theory Workbook
Years of research show that experiences we have in childhood interact with our neurons and our genetics to wire our brains in specific ways. Our experiences with attachment to our caregivers are significant because of the attachment circuitry in our brains. Listen to this week's podcast to learn a bit about this topic and how increasing our awareness of this topic can improve our relationships.
Attachment styles generally exist on a spectrum. Insecurely attached people can have both anxious and avoidant patterns at different times. This week, I'll talk about anxious insecure type. As the name suggests, people with this style tend to show the stress they feel in relationships through anxiety or anxious behaviors.
Learning about and understanding attachment theory and your attachment style makes it possible to improve, heal and repair complex or troubled relationships. There are four basic attachment styles: dismissive-avoidant, fearful-avoidant, anxious and secure. Listen to this week's podcast for a dive into the research, the theory, and why this is important for you to comprehend.
I am really passionate about this topic. I think the impact of emotional validation is much bigger than we believe. I hope that those who don't understand what validation means can be edified. I hope those who can't or don't want to validate will learn its benefits and change their minds. Listen to this week's podcast. Share it with your friends and partners to learn a great deal about emotional validation
Anger? Hubris? Self-righteousness? Pride? Hubris? Humility? In Brene Brown's Atlas of the Heart (see link below) she talks helps us know how these emotions show up at certain times of our lives. I think these words and her description(s) help us see how we feel when we feel wrong, are wrong, admit we are wrong or are wronged ourselves.
Listen to this week's podcast for encouragement to be personally vulnerable and increase your awareness of how these feelings impact your ability to be a better person within the context of relationships.
Atlas of the Heart
What does science say about people and being wrong? What is your history with mistakes? What messages did you learn about what it meant to do something "wrong?" What do you make being "right" mean? Listen to this week's podcast to see how the answers to these questions can decrease your relationship conflict, increase your life satisfaction, and unburden you of your misapprehension that being right makes people respect you.
When was the last time you openly admitted you were wrong about something? Maybe you reacted angrily toward your toddler about something that did not warrant it. Perhaps you started a fight with your partner, realized it was petty, but kept it going because you didn't know how to admit you were tired, or cranky, or wrong about what you thought was going on. Being wrong, recognizing we are wrong, and admitting we are wrong can feel very vulnerable and scary. Why is that? Listen to this week's podcast for some understanding and insight into this important topic. Learning how to be wrong and admit it is critical for happy, healthy relationships. It's also necessary to reduce cognitive dissonance and create psychological flexibility that creates of sense of peace and calm in the chaos.
A Short History of Nearly Everything
Listen to this week's podcast to hear the good things that we have been able to savor this week. Some are big and some are small, but that all have the same effect. This practice can increase our overall sense of well-being. Also, check out the music, mindfulness, and yoga links that helped me feel good this week.
Yoga Joy | Full Body Vinyasa Flow | Yoga With Adriene
Jaeger & Reid
The Path of Life (Insight Timer)
Neuroplasticity is the word that describes our brain's ability to change. We can do this through simple practices including looking for the good as described in this week's podcast. As your brain changes your mind changes. These changes bring improved resilience, increased confidence, decreased stress, and greater happiness. Listen to this week's podcast and practice engaging in the little things that have the potential to make big changes.
Metaphor requires the activation of not only thinking but also creative imagination and implementation of the “as if” technique, that makes the impossible possible.
Metaphors are often unconscious and the creation of metaphors selectively used sensory and bodily experience.
How to create a metaphor
What do you want to describe? An idea? A problem? An object?
What characteristic of the chosen object do you want to compare with another idea or object?
Look for the relationships. Write them down.
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Come join me and a couple of my kids to see how they describe having 8 siblings. For added fun, I will comment and give some parenting perspective to help all the parents out there wondering when it gets easier. Hint: it doesn't. However, it is always interesting.
We have a lot of thoughts. Most of them are stream of consciousness and surface level. Unfortunately, they are also mostly negative. Negative thinking, the kind that comes unbidden and without awareness. Negative thinking leads to poor mental health which leads to more negative thoughts which leads to poorer mental health.
You cannot avoid all negative thoughts, but you can begin to challenge them, reframe them and use positive thinking to counteract them. This can be done through a cognitive behavior therapy frame, for free, at home, and there is no downside.
Questions for Challenging Thoughts
Positive Replacement Thoughts
Identifying ANTS
Human beings have a tendency to think distorted thoughts. A lot of them. A cognitive distortion or a thinking error is an exaggerated pattern of thought that’s not based on facts. It consequently leads you to view things more negatively than they really are.
Cognitive distortions are when your mind convinces you to believe negative things about the world, your relationships, and yourself.
Our thoughts have a great impact on how we feel and how we behave. Everyone falls into cognitive distortions on occasion. It’s part of the human experience. This happens particularly when we’re feeling down, but if you engage too frequently in negative thoughts, your mental health can take a hit.
Becoming mindful of your cognitive distortions will help you better understand yourself and other people, and improve your decision-making.
It is useful to know that self-sabotage is your brain’s way of trying to protect you from emotional pain which includes the pain of changing old behaviors. Self-sabotaging is sometimes intentional and most often unconscious. The consequences of chronic self-sabotage can be pretty destructive. It depletes motivation, leaving us sad, anxious, and feeling worthless. What is it and how can we untangle ourselves from how we engage in it? Listen to this week's podcast for answers to these questions and more.
What Is Self-Sabotage? How to Help Stop the Vicious Cycle
Self-Sabotage
30 Types of Self-Sabotage (and What to Do About It): Learn how to get out of your own way.
Parental burnout is described as an exhaustion syndrome, both physical and emotional. This overwhelming exhaustion leads to emotional distancing from our children and increases our feelings of inadequacy and ineffective parenting. The tricky thing about parent burnout is that was are not supposed to be able to burnout. Parenting is "wonderful" and "fulfilling" and the "greatest joy" we can ever hope for. With those expectations, how do we deal with the reality of parent burnout? How do we undo the damage of COVID lockdowns, no school, home school, working from home, fear and frustrations. Even as we move into an endemic stage and can feel "normal" we might still feel burned out and we might be getting burned out.
Online Assessments and Inventories
Burnout Parental Assessment
Parental Stress Scale
Stress and Burnout Questionnaire
Burnout Self-Test Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI)
Articles
The impact of parental burnout: What psychological research suggests about how to recognize and overcome it
Parental Burnout: What Makes It Different
Narrative therapy is a technique for therapy that is supposed to help people separate themselves from their problems. Problems occur in cultural and social contexts. Using context and language, narrative therapy provides a way for a person to understand their own "Hero's Journey." Are you the hero or the victim of your story? Do you know? Listen to this week's podcast for an overview of what narrative therapy is and how it can be used to externalize your problems, re-author and integrate neglected aspects of yourself, and find meaning in your stories.
Narrative Therapy, Positive Psychology
Optimist Minds Worksheets
I'm ending this series on grief with a final review of "The Grief Recovery Handbook" which I think you all should read. There are steps and activities and accountability expectations in this book to help you work through your incomplete grief before it becomes depression, anxiety, or panic. Complicated grief is hard to deal with because it's not always okay to be happy someone has died, wish we were single, or want meaningful relationships to end. Our friends, neighbors, and loved ones may not be aware that their depression or anxiety is related to grief or loss. Be open and supportive, validate without trying to fix or convince someone they need to feel differently.
Grief and loss are emotional experiences. Unfortunately, we aren't very good at it, and we aren't very good at helping people with their grief. As a society, we are not taught how to deal with loss. Most of us don't like difficult emotions, we avoid, change the subject, and intellectualize the experience. Listen to this week's podcast as I continue reflecting on grief through the eyes of James and Friedman who wrote "The Grief Recovery Handbook."
We've been given a narrative about grief that does not necessarily serve all of our loss experiences. The 5 emotional stages were originally identified by Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross while she was working with terminally ill patients, palliative care, and hospice for those who were near death. It grew and is now widely used for bereavement, and other loss and change experiences. Friedman and James disagree with the overuse of the stages and believe there are more helpful ways to see our way through grief and loss. Also, we have learned a number of unhealthy ways to understand how to cope with our experiences. Listen to this week's podcast to see why unlearning old and learning new strategies to recover from our grief can help reduce depression and anxiety.
I'm reading "The Grief Recovery Handbook" and I think it's an interesting and unique way of looking at grief. In terms of therapy and counseling, pretty much everything can be linked to grief and trauma. I have seen research that shows where complicated or unresolved grief presents and is often diagnosed as depression. LIsten to this week's podcast as I begin a kind of book review and talk about grief - perhaps differently than you have heard before.
Do you try to control or influence areas where you don't actually have any? Do you try to control people or things with no results? Who do you feel controls you, your emotions, or some other area of your life? Do you run from, deny, or avoid situations, feelings, or realities? Codependency is a learned behavior that can be unlearned. Listen to this week's podcast to see if you have codependent tendencies and how to do something different.
This week I answer a question about making friends as an adult. You are not alone if you struggle with this. There are a lot of reasons this is hard, and there are a lot of limitations, but I do my best to provide ideas that are actually doable for both online relationships and in-person relationships. Following that, I have a conversation with myself about codependency, beginning with a definition. Any amount of codependency in your relationships will also impact your ability to set and respect boundaries. You will probably want to review the boundary podcasts after you hear this week's episode. Check out the links below for research on friendships, and codependency inventories you can see for free.
MIriam Kirmayer
Friel Co-Dependency Assessment Inventory
Codependency Questionnaire
Codependency: What are the Signs and How to Overcome it
Are you ready for therapy? Listen to this week's podcast for some important things to know as you look for a good fit. Self-care. What it is and what it is not. I'm not good at it, but I can tell you some ways to understand what it is, and how to make it a priority in your life.
Set reasonable expectations. Minimize your use of the words "should, must, or have to." Recognize that doing something is better than doing nothing. Use James Clear's 2-minute rule to accomplish tasks, and create new habits. Don't let perfect keep you from getting something done, and look for ways to have good enough relationships.
Validation is at the heart of our ability to get along with others and build relational bonds. Validation is the opposite of insulting, dismissing, or belittling. Age does not matter. People of all ages need validation. It's how we find our place in the world. Listen to this week's podcast to see how important it is for people to feel understood, seen, and heard. The act of validation increases trust and builds lasting relationships.
How do you tell if someone's criticism or complaints about you are your problems or theirs? Listen to this episode, and for a refresher on criticism and feedback, listen to Episode 36. There are a few things you can do to increase understanding and communication around this issue in your relationships.
Having self-awareness helps you understand other people and how they view you and your actions. Many people assume that self-awareness comes easily and naturally, however, it can be pretty hard, and can be improved. With practice, however, you can learn to increase your emotional intelligence and self-knowledge and find new ways to interpret your thoughts, actions, feelings, and conversations that you have with other people. Listen to this week's podcast and I will AGAIN talk about the importance of this trait. Check out the links for ways for individuals, couples and families to increase their self awareness.
We're Not Really Strangers
Our Moments Families
33 Self-Awareness Activities for Adults and Students
There is a lot going on in the world. Your kids need to feel that you can be there for them no matter what. They have their own relationships to deal with, friendships that are difficult, school stress, and access to a lot of distressing news and information. It is your job to help give them space to vent, receive feedback and advice, and trust that you can handle what they cannot. Listen to this week's podcast and you will hear Lindsay, Regan, and I talk through this issue.
Big Little Feelings
Dr. Becky Kennedy Instagram
Love and Logic
It would be impossible for me to express in words what you can only experience by engaging in mindfulness practice. So this week, I'm at it again. With a bit of new information and some reinforcement of some old, I am desperate to get you all to start practicing mindfulness. Please. Please. Please.
All relationships have conflict. Conflict does not make a relationship bad. The purpose of conflict is to gain a greater understanding of your partner. This podcast about understanding is about working to understand another person. Listen and I'll give strategies and things you can do to give your spouse the gift of understanding them. Using the idea of assumption of similarity and a speaker/listener format for drawing out information, you can gain a greater understanding to make conflict more manageable.
Conflict Blueprint
Despite the important role it plays in relationships, understanding does not have to be imperative in all interactions. Sometimes our need for understanding is connecting and helps move our relationships into more safety and security. Other times, a need to be understood is an example of our inability to hold boundaries. Occasionally our inability to understand is because we aren't doing the work of gathering information. Listen to this week's podcast to see why we really can't understand each other, and what your role is as a person in relationships.
What is the difference between hedonia and eudaimonia? What is a happiness set-point? How does my set-point affect my ability to be happy? Can happiness be pursued? Listen to this week's podcast for answers to these questions and more.
The Hedonic Treadmill - Are we Forever Chasing Rainbows?
How to measure happiness: hedonia vs. eudaimonia
In a world where the focus on happiness is growing and science is teaching us new things about how to create lasting happiness, it's time to learn what happiness means. The science helps us understand what happy people do differently, and how we can feel happier even when things feel overwhelming.
What Happy People Know by Dan Baker
The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living by Russ Harris
The Happiness Lab Podcast
According to James Clear, there are three levels of behavior change; the first is changing your outcomes, the second is changing your process, and the third is changing your identity. Perhaps you have habits you want to change regarding your relationships. Listen to this week's podcast to see how these two topics relate to one another.
Drs. John and Julie Gottman have identified 4 conflict communication styles that, unless addressed, can have dire effects on any relationship. Listen to this week's podcast, identify your styles and do the work of replacing them with their antidotes. I
Gottman Four Horsemen
The Four Horsemen: Criticism, Contempt, Defensiveness, and Stonewalling
Gottman - Small Things Often
The number one thing couples fight about is "nothing." Nothing can feel pretty bad, though. Drs. Julie and John Gottman offer some strategies for managing some of your perpetual conflicts. Additionally, perhaps we could be more open about our imperfect relationships to create a more realistic understanding of what "real" marriages look like. Listen to this week's podcast to open up new understanding.
Conflict is a Normal and Natural Part of Your “Happily Ever After” Manage Conflict: The Art of Compromise
How many types of relationship conflict are there? Let's talk this week about three specific types of conflict as described by Drs. Julie and John Gottman. In their Gottman Method Couples Therapy, they talk about solvable problems, perpetual problems, and gridlock perpetual problems. Listen to this week's podcast, and I'll give some basic information to get you started on increasing your understanding of how conflict shows up in your relationships. All the information I use in this podcast is available on the internet.
The Gottman Institute
Goals are good insofar as they provide direction for change and improvement. However, just having a goal is not likely to be accomplished without a change in the system. The system is how you choose to engage in the work to accomplish the goal. Atomic habits are the small, daily, repeated behaviors that help you engage in the process and achieve your goals.
Atomic Habits
James Clear
Welcome to 2022. It's time for the obligatory podcast about new year goals/resolutions. Except ... that's not where I am going to spend my time. James Clear wrote a book called "Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones". I'm going to share some personal experiences with goal setting, new year resolutions, successes, failures and how I figured out why I wasn't getting the results I wanted. James Clear's book was instrumental in helping me see how I could do something different, more satisfying and longer-lasting. James Clear
Being a child can be hard. Being an adult can be hard, and being an adult child can feel like you are always trying to find out who you are, what you want to be, and how you want to engage in your world separate and apart from your family of origin. Listen to today's podcast to learn some ways to engage in setting boundaries with your parents. Values, compassion, assertive communication, and appreciation are all part of setting health boundaries.
What type of parent are you? What are your values? It is useful to have some answers to these questions as you listen to this podcast about parents and parenting boundaries. There are a lot of ways to navigate how you stay in your circle while your kids stay in theirs.
Taking a break from boundaries to talk about Christmas traditions. About 12 years ago, we started "Christmas Service Letters" as a gift from the kids to mom and dad. This is a podcast about that.
Are you struggling with the words to use to set boundaries, reinforce expectations or reach out for help? Listen to this week's podcast to hear me talk about appropriate ways to communicate and discuss important topics. I will also run through a dozen or so different scenarios that can be generalized to just about any boundary setting experience.
I Statements
Soft Start-Up
Are you a boundary keeper? Or maybe you are a boundary violator. Do you take more than you give, or give more than you take? This week's podcast is very much focused on introspection. What kind of person are you? This is a critical question to explore in the context of your relationships and how you want to experience life. I share a little bit about my boundary style, and how I see boundaries play out in my life and my family.
Join me for the first episode in some kind of series about boundaries. Based on your input through Instagram, I am hopeful I can be specific in answering questions and truly helping you all sort through this complex issue. It's hard for all of us - don't be discouraged. I'll help you work through all the nuances. Also, see below for the resource material I am using.
Therapist Aid
Positive Psychology
In Sanity: A Piece of Mind - Positive Characteristics and Clarifying Values
Building Better Boundaries
Greater Good Science Center offers a whole lot of data on the benefits of gratitude. In a 2018 paper titled "The Science of Gratitude," they outline the following benefits of a gratitude practice:
increased happiness and positive mood, more satisfaction with life, less materialistic, less likely to experience burnout, better physical health, better sleep, less fatigue, lower levels of cellular inflammation, greater resiliency, and encourages the development of patience, humility, and wisdom
Additionally, every time a person expresses or receives gratitude, dopamine releases in the brain. Dopamine, a neurotransmitter, is produced in two areas of the brain: the substantia nigra and the ventral tegmental. The former has to do with movement and speech, the latter with reward (Carter, 2009). When a person expresses or receives gratitude, dopamine releases, thus making a connection between the behavior and feeling good. The more a person practices gratitude, the more often dopamine releases.
Listen to this week's episode for ways to begin a lifelong practice of gratitude.
Resources:
https://ggsc.berkeley.edu/images/uploads/GGSC-JTF_White_Paper-Gratitude-FINAL.pdf
We all have things we want to change. They might be pretty big aspirations and perhaps we are working on them. Or maybe changing big things seems too overwhelming. I get it. What if a few areas could be improved by doing one thing that requires almost ZERO effort. That is what today's podcast is about. Very often big changes can be made by little moves here and there. Listen this week to see if there is one thing you can change to improve your overall well-being.
Stress shows up in our minds, in our bodies, and in our behaviors. We feel stress when we perceive a lack of stability between the work we have to do and the time or resources we have to get things done. Stress management is creating techniques or strategies to deal more effectively with stress. Knowing the different types of stressors, understanding how they show up and your triggers, allows you to find ways to cope.
Generally, the words "feeling" and "emotion" are used interchangeably, but there are distinct differences between them. It is important to know the difference because it can change how we react to our emotions and feelings, how we model these experiences, and how we behave. Listen to this week's podcast to understand what is going on inside of you, and how you can become more mindfully aware of the interplay.
Resilience is something we can all develop, whether we want to grow as individuals, as a family, or as a society. Listen to today's podcast and take a short quiz to see how resilient you are. Then keep listening to find out to increase your resilience. It will be worth your time, I promise.
Also, follow me @in_sanitypodcast for additional information and content related to each week's podcast.
Evidence Mounts That Mindfulness Breeds Resilience
Resilience in Positive Psychology: Bouncing Back & Staying Strong
Resiliency Quiz - How Resilient Are You?
This week, my son Christian joins me to talk about resilience and kids. He's a great resource, not only for his personal experience with resilience in playing sports, including college baseball but also because he has worked with kids for the past several years in different behavioral health settings. He has a lot of great insights that are well worth the listen.
Check out the show notes for the resilience zone image Christian was talking about, and the Red Sox article I quoted at the end.
Trauma/Resiliency Zone
Resilience has been the key characteristic for this Red Sox team
I've got some ideas about resilience that I want to address in the next few podcasts. You will certainly learn things, and have some fun with more of my kids - at least that's the plan. Resilience is an important trait that improves happiness and life satisfaction. The good news is that it can be cultivated and developed.
Is criticism hard for you to take? Can the people in your life offer you feedback? Do you get defensive and criticize back? What are your limitations in taking criticism? Listen to this week's podcast to see how you can better prepare yourself to take criticism and respond more positively to feedback. Think of it as a gift and gain some resilience by applying the 10 strategies outlined in today's podcast. Check out the show notes for some additional resources.
How to Receive Feedback with a Growth Mindset
What is a Growth Mindset: 8 Ways to Develop One
Happiness - is it a state or a trait? Is it the same as pleasure? What does it have to do with well-being? Can you be happy in life if your life lacks meaning? There is a lot of stuff to unpack as it relates to happiness and how we experience it. This podcast discusses qualities that happy people have, and how they can be used to create savoring rituals.
What Happy People Know by Dan Baker, Ph.D. and Cameron Stauth
The Road to Serfdom by F.A. Hayek
How would you rate your level of well-being? Are you physically fit? Do you feel spiritually connected? Do you make time for a mindfulness practice? Take some time to answer these questions, listen to the podcast and see what other areas of your life might need improvement. Cultivating well-being takes a lot of work. It takes commitment, and a desire to live life making quality tasks a priority.
Join me and a couple of my daughters to continue a discussion about parenting. Things really have changed, and parenting has changed. My girls share their insights and add to my own about how parenting "with the brain in mind" really is an effective way to help create secure attachments with your kids (which is another topic to be addressed at a later time), reduce tantrums, encourage brain integration, and help you (the adult) develop your "parenting brain."
Below are some resources.
Big Little Feelings -- check out Instagram @biglittlefeelings
Dr. Becky Kennedy -- check out Instagram @drbeckygoodinside
Parenting from the Inside Out: How a Deeper Self-Understanding Can Help You Raise Children Who Thrive
Brain Based Parenting: The Neuroscience of Caregiving for Healthy Attachment (Norton Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology)
Drs. Dan Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson have written a book called "The Whole-Brain Child: 12 Revolutionary Strategies to Nurture Your Child's Developing Mind." In this podcast, I break down the strategies to provide access to this information for any who may be interested. The book is very much worth reading and is easy to understand and valuable for anybody with a brain.
The Whole-Brain Child: 12 Revolutionary Strategies to Nurture Your Child's Developing Mind
The River of Well-Being
The Upstairs and Downstairs of the Brain: Part One
Time is not a limited commodity because it is always there, unfolding every second before you. Focusing on time creates stress and dissatisfaction with life. You have enough time, we all do.
Put First things First
Become the Master of Your Time
When we avoid or distract from negative emotions, we close ourselves down. This practice might numb us from the emotions we don't want to feel, but it also numbs us from the emotions we want to feel. Feeling them all is the only answer to wholehearted living.
“If a problem is fixable, if a situation is such that you can do something about it, then there is no need to worry. If it's not fixable, then there is no help in worrying. There is no benefit in worrying whatsoever.”
― Dalai Lama XIV
Thanks for sticking with this multi-part series on worry. There are solutions, and there is hope for less chronic worry.
Keep listening and learn how to keep the worry nests out of your hair.
The Worry Trick by David Carbonell, PhD
If we aren't supposed to worry, why is there so much to worry about? Here in this first podcast about worry, learn the difference between worry and anxiety, and how worry tricks us into thinking doubt is danger.
Emotions are just visitors. You can invite them in and you can invite them to leave.
SUDS Scale
Dialectical Behavior Therapy
Hodge Podge: a heterogeneous mix; a jumble. Now, do what I did and look up heterogeneous.
Food is not good or bad. It just is. However, it is always possible to eat to make us feel better and to make us feel worse. That may look different for all of us. Listen to today's podcast and learn how to eat for better mental health. Feelings and behaviors occur, our body has cravings to satisfy our deficiencies and we feel better for a "minute." Increasing neurotransmitter production, and amino acids action can help regulate the negative feelings and behaviors; this is PTSD, anxiety, depression, and other mental illnesses. Show notes: I used a lot of basic information from the LiveStrong website. Food over Medicine This Is Your Brain on Food: An Indispensible Guide to the Surprising Foods that Fight Depression, Anxiety, PTSD, OCD, ADHD, and More The Gut-Mind Connection: How the Hidden Conversation Within Our Bodies Impacts Our Mood, Our Choices, and Our Overall Health
In order to teach kids values, parents and caretakers have to have them. It seems prudent then, to teach kids to HAVE values. These usually come from morals which are generally learned in the home. Listen to this week's podcast for a few tips and some useful information about how parents and young people alike can figure out how to use values to create a happy, healthy, productive life.
Stick with me for some more important groundwork about food and mental health. Amino acids are an important compound and come in a variety of "flavors" and "styles." They play a pretty big part in mental health and your best source is your food. I guarantee you won't have to change much in order to increase or decrease what you are already eating to feel mentally and emotionally better.
Mood and Food, Part 1
Your brain is always on and requires a constant supply of fuel. Food is that fuel. What you eat affects the way you feel in body, mind and spirit. Listen to part 1 to learn a bit about the brain, a bit more about neurotransmitters, and the part food plays in the balance of those neurotransmitters.
Brain Basics: Know your Brain
This episode talks a bit more about parenting styles. I also talk a bit about why it's important to allow, even encourage children to make mistakes. Once the mistakes have been made, there are two types of consequences. Listen to find out what they are, how they work, and what you can do to improve effectiveness.
Check out the website and the books on Amazon.
Love and Logic Parenting
Parenting with Love and Logic
There are 4 different styles of parenting. Most parents have a little bit of all of them. If you understand what they are and how they affect children, you can decide if and how you would like to adjust. Listen to this week's episode to find out your style.
Mindfulness isn't magic and it can't cure heart disease, but it is a helpful tool. There are a lot of benefits, and more and more research is being conducted. Like any other strength practice, it's important to practice regularly.
Michel de Montaigne got it right - The greatest thing in the world is to know how to belong to oneself. Check out this week's episode and the resources in the show notes for ways to increase, improve and live life self-aware. It is not selfish or self-centered. It is a way of being that increases your ability to be in relationships of all kinds and types knowing how you positively and negatively impact those relationships. And then, you can self-correct.
Why Self-Awareness Is Important: Benefits, Tips, and Examples
10 Simple Ways to Improve Your Self-Awareness [With Examples]
Emotional Intelligence
Rising as we lift others, empowering women to reach for the stars, shedding the shame of not being good enough - that's all on us, ladies. Listen to this week's podcast for a few relatively easy ways to support and strengthen the women you know in creating their very best selves.
Sounds like I'm in a feedback loop with podcast topics. Not so. Listen to this one, and I promise you will hear new and interesting ideas about how to feel less anxious, how to worry less, how not to get sucked into future tripping. Listen to today's podcast to hear the metaphor that helps me keep all those feelings at bay.
In this episode, I talk metaphor. Life is like a difficult trail run or bike ride, at least for me. I've learned some good lessons that I'd like to share with all of you.
Join me and a few of my kids this week for a conversation about pets. When you have 9 kids, you might end up having 90 pets, and then you will likely have 900 stories about those pets. We barely scratched the surface. Maybe one day there will be another pet podcast.
Noel the hamster
Humane Society Foster Program
Why do you journal? Why do you not journal? This week I talk a bit about my journal journey - the good and the bad. I will also give some insight into how and why journaling is an effective intervention to help with depression, anxiety, PTSD, and stress reduction. Peruse the links for more information about how and why this is the case.
83 Benefits of Journaling for Depression, Anxiety, and Stress
Center for Journal Therapy
As promised, here's a bit on mindfulness for kids. According to brain imaging research, practicing mindfulness can alter brain structure in a way that can improve childrens' reaction to stress. It thickens the cerebral cortex, which is responsible for perception and reasoning and increases blood flow in the brain. Additionally, mindfulness helps reduce anxiety and depression. Worth your time, I promise.
Below are several resources, in no particular order, for you to peruse at your leisure.
Autoimmune disease and stress: Is there a link?
Association of Stress-Related Disorders With Subsequent Autoimmune Disease
How to Teach Mindfulness to Kids - at any age
The Benefits of Mindfulness Meditation for Teens
10 Mindfulness Activities for Teens
11 Ways to Teach Mindfulness to Kids
51 Mindfulness Exercises for Kids in the Classroom
"The mind is just like a muscle - the more you exercise it, the stronger it gets and the more it can expand." Idowu Kyenikan
Mindfulness is this process. It's a big topic, and I've just barely scratched its surface. I will likely address it repeatedly, but for now, check out this introduction. Also, listen next week for tips, tricks, and information about mindfulness for kiddos.
Here are some of my current favorite resources. Not everything in all of these books resonates with me. I feel fine about picking and choosing what works. Do some searching and find those that resonate with you.
The Mindfulness Solution: Everyday Practices for Everyday Problems
The Science of Mindfulness: A research-based path to well-being (this is a Great Courses from Audible)
Becoming Supernatural
Five Differences between Mindfulness and Meditation
The Power of Now
The Yoga of Christ
Will Rogers said that we should never miss an opportunity to shut up. This episode is packed full of great information about how good listening skills can change our relationships and our lives.
If you need a logo, email and check out https://www.saltyannie.com/. Also her Instagram @saltyannie_design. She's great, and you will love her.
Being a martyr is hard work. It might even be harder than being a mother. In the immortal words of Bob Newhart, "Stop it."
Here are a few of the resources for your perusal.
https://jessconnell.com/mommy-martyr/
https://www.instagram.com/drjuliehanks/
Are you a martyr for your motherhood. If you keep an honest journal, go back and read it. You might find what I found - a lot of stuff about how you managed motherhood that you forgot. Listen this week for a bit of information on how mommy martyrdom played out in my life, and why my experience may have been different than yours. Then listen next week and find out how language, conversation, assumptions, and interpretations keep us stuck in the martyrdom cycle, and how you can break out.
We live in a world where there is a dearth of values understanding. In addition to how values can help you live your best life, they can also increase our understanding of others. Additionally, little good comes from inadvertently buying into the values of the predominant culture. Listen to today's episode to learn some specifics about how and why you should attend to your values, and how I figured out my positive characteristics by doing so.
Here are the resource materials for today's episode.
Articles
Self-affirmation activates brain systems associated with self-related processing and reward and is reinforced by future orientation
The Impact of Self-Affirmation on Health-Behavior Change: A Meta-Analysis
Positive thinking: Stop negative self-talk to reduce stress
Books
What Happy People Know by Dan Baker, PhD., and Cameron Stauth
Unselfie Why Empathetic Kids Succeed in Our All-About-Me World by Michelle Borba, Ed.D.
Becoming Supernatural by Dr. Joe Dispenza
The Mindful Self Compassion Workbook, by Kristen Neff, Ph.D., and Christopher Germer, Ph.D.
Thanks for tuning in, and if you find it valuable, interesting, or useful, please feel free to share it with your friends.
Listen to how and why investment in moving your body is scientifically proven to make your life better as you age. The book(s) Younger Next Year for Women: Live Strong, Fit, and Sexy -- Until You're 80 and Beyond, and Younger Next Year Live Strong, Fit and Sexy -- Until You're 80 and Beyond were instrumental in motivating my husband and I to start moving. This podcast is part of our story. I hope one day you can sign the guestbook in the ammo can.
https://www.youngernextyear.com/
*turn back your biological clock
So they say that if you have something to say, you will find those who want or need to hear you say it. I've toyed around with this podcast idea for a while now. It's time. I'm looking forward to finding my tribe, and I hope you will want to be a part of it.
Do you have a book you want to write? A podcast you want to start? What would you like to accomplish, and would accountability help? This podcast illustrates how I inadvertently created accountability for myself, and where it has taken me. Get yourself an accountability buddy, and take some action.