Diving into the Blue(s)

Depression.  The Black Dog.  The Emotional Flu.  The Blues.  
Along with anxiety, mood issues are a major source of discomfort for folks with the Troublesome Trifecta: Big Feelings, Big Radar and Big Processers. 
Depression is nothing new and, at least in its more common appearance, nothing rare.  Most people will go through periods of sadness in their lives when energy and concentration lags, thinking is cloudy, and the future looks dim.  It's normal following the loss of a loved one, illness, catastrophe or other sorts of regular life hardship. Time and emotional support will usually be enough to address these dips into dark places.  Jungians say aspects of depression can be a strange sort of gift:  the slowing down, withdrawing and going into one's thoughts can offer opportunity for rest and reflection.  Depression can be Psyche's way of expressing dissatisfaction with Ego's choices and a chance to think about what soul truly needs.

What's known in the biz as "clinical depression" is another matter.  This sort of emotional upheaval is so intrusive and persistent that the sufferer's life is affected in multiple ways. Work, relationships and physical health are disrupted.  Levels can vary from mildly incapacitating to life-threatening, and the sadness may be recurrent, with periods of remission and relapse. There appears to be a strong genetic component.  In families with histories of mood disorder there may be generations of substance abuse: perhaps markers of attempts at self-medication.

Symptoms of clinical depression as listed in the DSM-IV include sadness (you knew that one, right?), loss of interest in previously pleasurable activities, sleep disturbance (too much/little),  fatigue both physical and mental, clouded thinking and inability to make a decision, weight changes (loss of appetite is usually more significant than gain), thoughts about death and suicide, and the triple-threat-thoughts of helplessness, hopelessness and guilt.  Again, most everyone has some of these, some of the time, for a bit.  But for persons with clinical depression the symptoms persist, aren't necessarily related to anything happening in the outside world, and interrupt functioning on one or more levels.

The thinking can be the worst part.  Depressive thinking feels Very Big, Very True, and it's a liar.  It says:  You're worthless.  You've always felt this bad.  You'll always feel this bad.  You're a burden.  The worst outcome of the lies of depression is suicide.  Depression can be a fatal disease.

In Japan, the colloquialism for depression is "kokuro no kaze", which translates roughly to "when the soul has a cold."  Prior to a major marketing campaign by big pharma, depression wasn't much discussed in Japan, but the idea that one's soul could feel weak, leaky and lousy resonated with a lot of people.  Likening it to physical ailment rather than a character defect lessened the societal stigma, and inquiries to the medical profession about how one could address depressive symptoms immediately and dramatically increased, as did sales of antidepressant drugs.

In the US, antidepressants are at the top of the list for most prescribed drugs; some studies say nearly 10% of the US adult population currently take them.  Ads for antidepressant therapies are ubiquitious.  You can't flip through five pages of most pop magazines without seeing dramatic before and after pictures of hapless, then happy souls.  The symptoms described in some ads are general enough that most anyone could relate on a bad Monday.  Such campaigns have inspired numerous parodies.  Click here to see one from the satire newsmag The Onion. Reprinted as fact in a few web sources, it was apparently so close to actual ads that outraged readers couldn't tell it was in jest.   I want to be clear: antidepressants have made a significant and positive difference for many persons with depression.   There are also concerns about their overuse, effectiveness,side effects and limitations.   Medication is one approach to treatment of depression; we'll talk about that and other interventions in a future blog.

There are many authors who believe the high rate of medical intervention for depression is a result of overpathologizing these unavoidable life events.  I think it's a little more complicated than that.  Changes in American life, from technological and environmental to social, may all play a part in rising reports of depression.  Probable suspects are abundant.  Artificial light and poor wake/sleep cycles (not to mention environmental contaminants) mess with our hormonal systems.   As a nation, we eat a lot but are often poorly nourished.  We are too busy and we are much too stressed.  We don't sweat enough to work out all those fight-or-flight chemicals our brains pump out to deal with those stressors.  And we don't have nearly the social supports we had before we all moved so often, worked so much, and dropped out of networks (churches, clubs, coffee circles) where we could ask for and get support.

Psychiatrist Jim Phelps, a specialist in mood disorders, has been mentioned several times in my blog for good reason.  If you want a lot of great information on depression, its causes and treatments, check out his website or order his book Why Am I Still Depressed?.  He takes very complicated information on the genetics, neurology and treatment of mood disorders and makes it understandable and interesting.  You'll notice he talks a lot about Bipolar disorder.  Don't let that scare you.  Dr. Phelps makes a convincing argument (supported by leading researchers in the field) that most depressions are part of a spectrum of mood issues called "soft" Bipolar or Bipolar II, where periods of low mood are accompanied or interspersed with anxiety, irritability and other symptoms.  His site includes information on medical, therapy and lifestyle treatments with known positive benefits for addressing the symptoms and causes of depression. 

The most important thing to know:  depression is real.  It's a full-body illness, with physical, social, cognitive and emotional effects.  It is treatable and recovery happens.  Don't let it run you.  The WHO commissioned the video below.  Share it with others, and pass the word that the Black Dog doesn't have to have the last word.

A Troublesome Trifecta

Being an oldtimer in the field, I've picked up patterns in clients over the years that are interesting and often predictive.  I noticed the kids I saw that struggled in English and more theoretical classes but were good at kinesthetic learning tended to have cross-dominance handedness as well as temper or opposition issues.  Anecdotal, but interesting, and there's probably a good neurological basis.

A very common feature I see in clients with anxiety and depression issues is what I call the troublesome trifecta.  These folks have a combination of traits:  Big Radar (they take in everything), Big Sensitivity (they feel it bigger) and Big Brains (they want to analyze everything).   As a result they have a high signal to noise ratio and spend lots of energy trying to figure out the data they are receiving.   Since much of it is noise, life can be pretty exhausting.

As stated in a recent blog, I'm a firm believer in the great benefits of the natural variation of human experience.  In other words, let's not pathologize everything.  But I can tell you, folks with the troublesome trifecta are both burdened and blessed.  Maybe they were bathed too long in the Oxytocin waters, and now that's what runs through their veins.  They see everything through the excruciating lens of Love's Potential.  They tend towards the ruminating spirit, as actor/director Jodie Foster called it in a recent interview with the National Alliance on Mental Illness.  The blessings come in the form of increased empathy and higher highs, creativity and a deep curiosity.  The burdens, unfortunately, come from the same place: the capacity for deep wounding, heaviness, and feelings of not being up for the Call.


Some people intentionally choose not to love and feel deeply.  Deep connection can result in deep loss when the connection closes, through choice or circumstance.  Highly empathic folk don't have a real choice about their capacity to experience life deeply.  But they may try to to run interference with the effects by dimming input with  drugs and other distractions. 


Half the battle is learning to know and love ourselves for who we are.  The other half is taking responsibility, even if we don't have the choice, for our limitations/strengths.  We can find ways to tone down the noise, to sort out the signal.  It requires attention and intention.  It is easier in the short run to be self-aversive or try and become comfortably numb.  That's back to losing the baby when we throw out the bathwater.  As Tom Waits sings, "If I exorcise my devils, my angels may flee too" (and he stole that line from Oscar Wilde, I think, though I can't find it now).  But it is our job--our calling-- to be aware of our impact with its gifts and limitations and take responsibility that it doesn't harm others.

Yes, I wrangle with the troublesome three-- well, at least the big radar/big sensitivity part.  I notice a lot and I don't naturally have a big filter.  This works well in my profession, especially if I apply the analysis to the data.   As always, I'm going for door number two in addressing the effects of this predisposition.  I want to wrestle with my demons and see what they have to teach, and trust my angels to keep me in line.  I want to keep enough shadow to know both light and dark when I see it and to pay attention to what I can learn there.  I don't want to trade knowledge with its discomfort and connection and wind up with blissful ignorance, at least over the long haul.

But I know there are tasks for me if I chose the less traveled road.  I need to practice mindfulness, gentle curiosity, and deep compassion as emotions and thoughts spontaneously arrive, sometimes unwelcome.  I can stay in wise mind of not-knowing the outcome.  I can decide when I've worried enough about some difficult matter and see that indulgence is of benefit to no one.  I can engage in acts of kindness and bravery despite lack of motivation or surpluses of fear.   I can practice self-soothing, not relying on others to have been hit in the same way I might be by a recent experience,  I know there is enough suffering in the daily that I won't look for entertainment in the nightly news or latest tearjearking Oscar winner.  I can sing not in spite of suffering but because there is suffering, and hope that like me, others may need my song more than my tears.  I can cry, too, when I need to, but not take residence in my tears.  I want to be available, and that means respecting my ability to deeply feel and connect, and knowing when to go quiet and replenish.

It may be that my childhood led to my family role as a caretaker.  It may be that some sensory integration deficits led to my enormous sponge for interloping sensory information,  It could be I became awash in excess oxtocyin in the womb and am forever reacting to its urgings or chasing its replacements.  For me , I am less interested in the why of how we end up who we are.  I want to learn how to best swim this ocean I am in, with respect for myself and the paths and people I cross and impact.

It ain't easy.  And it's important, beautiful, essential we don't give it up learning how to navigate these beautiful, dangerous waters.

How so?  Come back soon for tools I have gathered on the way.

Cheers from the Crowd

 Happy Valentine's Day.  Here's your own personal love-fest-valentine from Danielle Laporte, a women who blogs with the byline: "Because Self Realization Rocks".  Thanks to my sisters for the tip.

The Manifesto of Encouragement

And now a brief pause in the Sturm und Drang for: LOVE!

 Happy almost valentine's day!
What the world needs is more love and less paperwork. --Pearl Bailey.
This is one of my favorite holidays-- a chance to love it up.  Don't be fooled by the commercials.  V day isn't just for lovers or to sell stuff.  It's a great excuse to think about love in all its wonderful variations, and to show it to those who engender it in you.
Most years I make valentines; this year's were made last night late and won't get mailed until tomorrow.   Or maybe next week.  I'm a lousy mailer.  But February is the longest shortest month there is, so I am happy to drag out the love-fest.  Mine are pretty simple: a quote and a picture glued to a piece of pretty paper. Sometimes I add some paint and glitter.  This year I am being a minimalist.

If you haven't made a valentine yet ,this year's quote batch is  below.   Go ahead, let someone know you love them.
xox, Jana

We are all a little weird and life's a little weird, and when we find someone whose weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall in mutual weirdness and call it love. 

~Author Unknown

Must, bid the Morn awake!
Sad Winter now declines,
Each bird doth choose a mate;
This day's Saint Valentine's.
For that good bishop's sake
Get up and let us see
What beauty it shall be
That Fortune us assigns.
~Michael Drayton

Love is a smoke made with the fume of sighs. 

~William Shakespeare

Many are the starrs I see, but in my eye no starr like thee.

 Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love. 

 ~Albert Einstein

kisses are a better fate
than wisdom.
~e.e. cummings

Who, being loved, is poor? 

Oscar Wilde

Without love, what are we worth?  Eighty-nine cents!  Eighty-nine cents worth of chemicals walking around lonely. 

 ~M*A*S*H, Hawkeye

Love is the magician that pulls man out of his own hat. 

 ~Ben Hecht

Time is too slow for those who wait, too swift for those who fear, too long for those who grieve, too short for those who rejoice, but for those who love, time is eternity. 

 ~Henry Van Dyke

Take away love and our earth is a tomb. 

 ~Robert Browning

Are we not like two volumes of one book? 

 ~Marceline Desbordes-Valmore

Love makes your soul crawl out from its hiding place. 

 Zora Neale Hurston

We don't believe in rheumatism and true love until after the first attack. 

Marie Ebner Von Eschenbach

I love thee - I love thee,
'Tis all that I can say
It is my vision in the night,
My dreaming in the day.
~Thomas Hood

Love, and a cough, cannot be hid. 

 ~George Herbert

Love unlocks doors and opens windows that weren't even there before. 

 ~Mignon McLaughlin

Poetry spills from the cracks of a broken heart, but flows from one which is loved.  ~Christopher Paul Rubero

Tell me how many beads there are
In a silver chain
Of evening rain,
Unravelled from the tumbling main,
And threading the eye of a yellow star: -
So many times do I love again.
~Thomas Lovell Beddoes

The heart has its reasons that reason knows nothing of. 

~Blaise Pascal

At the touch of love, everyone becomes a poet. 

 ~Plato

Nobody has ever measured, even poets, how much a heart can hold. 

 ~Zelda Fitzgerald

Ah me! love can not be cured by herbs.  ~Ovid

Soul meets soul on lovers' lips. 

Percy Bysshe Shelley

Who would give a law to lovers?  Love is unto itself a higher law. 

Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy

Candle light, moon light, star light,
The brightest glow is from love light.
Grey Livingston

A baby is born with a need to be loved - and never outgrows it. 

 Frank A. Clark

Anyone can be passionate, but it takes real lovers to be silly. 

Rose Franken

Love is like dew that falls on both nettles and lilies. 

Swedish Proverb

It is astonishing how little one feels alone when one loves. 

John Bulwer

Love is not singular except in syllable.  Marvin Taylor

Love is the poetry of the senses.  ~Honoré de Balzac

True love comes quietly, without banners or flashing lights.  If you hear bells, get your ears checked.  ~Erich Segal

Love is what you've been through with somebody.  ~James Thurber

As soon go kindle fire with snow, as seek to quench the fire of love with words. 

~William Shakespeare

My heart to you is given:
Oh, do give yours to me;
We'll lock them up together,
And throw away the key.
~Frederick Saunders

Love is the greatest refreshment in life.  ~Pablo Picasso

Give me a kisse, and to that kisse a score;
Then to that twenty, adde a hundred more;
A thousand to that hundred; so kisse on,
To make that thousand up a million;
Treble that million, and when that is done,
Let's kisse afresh, as when we first begun.
~Robert Herrick, "To Anthea (III)"

Love is a canvas furnished by Nature and embroidered by imagination. 

~Voltaire

Love is metaphysical gravity.  ~R. Buckminster Fuller

If I had a single flower for every time I think about you, I could walk forever in my garden. 

Claudia Ghandi

"Each moment of a happy lover's hour is worth an age of dull and common life."

 Aphra Behn

"You know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams."

Dr. Seuss

"Love is the condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own."

Robert Heinlein

"Love is something eternal; the aspect may change, but not the essence."

-Vincent van Gogh

"A life without love is like a year without summer." -Swedish Proverb

"Love is a symbol of eternity. It wipes out all sense of time, destroying all memory of a beginning and all fear of an end."

 -Author Unknown

"Anyone can catch your eye, but it takes someone special to catch your heart." -Author Unknown

"Love is a smoke made with the fume of sighs." -William Shakespeare

"Life's greatest happiness is to be convinced we are loved." -Victor Hugo

"Love is the only gold."

Lord Alfred Tennyson

"To love is to receive a glimpse of heaven." -Karen Sunde

"Oh, if it be to choose and call thee mine, love, thou art every day my Valentine!"

 Thomas Hood

"When love is not madness, it is not love."

Pedro Calderon de la Barca

"Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love."

Albert Einstein

"Many are the starrs I +see, but in my eye no starr like thee."

“I never knew how to worship until I knew how to love."
Henry Ward Beecher

"To love another person is to see the face of God."
-Les Miserables

"Love is but the discovery of ourselves in others, and the delight in the recognition."
-Alexander Smith

"The richest love is that which submits to the arbitration of time."
-Lawrence Durrell

“Very small degree of hope is sufficient to cause the birth of love."
Stendhal

"There is no remedy for love but to love more."
Thoreau

"Love cures people - both the ones who give it and the ones who receive it."
Dr. Karl Menninger

"To love and win is the best thing. To love and lose, the next best."
William M. Thackeray

"Love is like playing the piano. First you must learn to play by the rules, then you must forget the rules and play from your heart."
Unknown

"Within you, I lose myself. Without you, I find myself wanting to be lost again."
Unknown

Attention is the most basic form of love, through it we bless and are blessed.
John Tarrant

Love is more than three words mumbled before bedtime. Love is sustained by action, a pattern of devotion in the things we do for each other every day.
Nicholas Sparks

Love doesn't make the world go round, love is what makes the ride worthwhile.
Elizabeth Browning

Love is a canvas furnished by Nature and embroidered by imagination.

Voltaire

 
Love is an act of endless forgiveness, a tender look which becomes a habit.
Peter Ustinov

Love is the greatest refreshment in life.
Picasso

Love is the joy of the good, the wonder of the wise, the amazement of the gods.
Plato

When you love someone, all your saved-up wishes start coming out.
Elizabeth Bowen

One who wants to do good, knocks at the gate; one who loves, finds the door open.

Rabindranath Tagore

This is your brain on drugs...

 As always, for more information click the highlighted links.

First-- that's a misleading title.  I really want to talk about neurotransmitters, not drugs.  Let's call them NTs for short, because I am a lazy typist.

NTs are the little chemical stews that regulate much of our emotional life.  Too short or overstocked on some, and we fall on one end or another of the bell curve that folks call "normal".  In the next few posts I will be talking about the spectrum of difference we call mental disorders and how chemistry may be involved.  I will be doing some wild speculating, so take me with a grain-- or block-- of salt.  The theories spring from many years of work in the field and lots of reading, as well as my own particular biases.

Let's start with my biases.  I think that humans are profoundly affected by both nature and nurture.  By nature, I mean the machines of our particular genetics and the effect of environment on the same.  Familial nutrition (up to generations back), and current physical environment such as toxin exposure effect the nature part.  By nurture, I am referring not only to the emotional climate of our upbringing but exposure to information and experiences throughout life.  I firmly believe in the plasticity of every brain-- the ability to reroute, change and grow in spite of our genetics.  But I also believe those genetics set up the game.

Seems to me those pesky NTs and hormones play a pretty big role.  How much dopamine, oxytocin, testosterone, serotonin etc is flowing in the system-- either manufactured or being able to be received and used-- appears to have a lot to do with how we act and feel.  It may define our temperament and personality. 

I also believe that humans are naturally narcissistic.  As one author put it (and sorry, being a print surfer I can't remember where I read this), everything we know, feel, see comes through our filter and has happened to us. We are the lead actor in our lives, and the rest of the world our backdrop.   From birth on, we see our view as The View.  Luckily, we are usually naturally altruistic too.  But since our genes and those pesky NTs may decide in advance what we feel, we may have a lot harder time understanding how it is that someone else can feel or act a lot differently. What we cannot perceive, we cannot receive. In addition to what we learn, see and experience, NTs are involved in development of empathy.  Some of us have a lot of it, and others not so much.

More biases:  I think "normal" is overrated.  We benefit greatly from the variation of expression and thinking that results from the edges of that bell curve.  Folks with what I suspect is lots less dopamine than the average homo sapien tend to be perfectionistic, orderly, obsessively detailed and restricted in their emotional range and expression.  They don't get overly excited or reactive, and they are meticulous in thinking and performance.  That's just what I want in my accountant or surgeon.  I'm not saying that all in those field are like that, but that it is adaptive and helpful in certain professions or experiences.  On the other hand, people with bipolar disorder tend to have lots of energy, emotion and enthusiasm- at least some of the time--- as well as creativity, quick-wittedness, and quirkiness.  They make better artists than those dopamine-deprived folks.  Again, I am talking in generalities.

Last bias:  as hinted in the previous paragraph, I think nature is doing its deal by spreading out the variations to the gene pool.  Barbara Kingsolver talks about this in her book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle.  In any given year, heirloom (read: not genetically modified) corn seed will produce a variable yield.  That's because some of the seed works well in wet years, some in dry; some with early warmth and some with later frosts.  This insures that any given year at least some of that corn will grow.  It's no different with us humans.  Some of our genetic tendencies will be either culturally or environmentally more desirable in a given era.  Luckily, it's not only those that get passed down, because times change.

Related post:  What's in A Name?  Diagnostic Dilemmas

That's it for tonight. See you soon,
Jana
Must be an Ani DiFranco sort of week...

Finding Your Perfect Look

A fly fisherman I once knew had the sweetest smile, with a little groove on his left front tooth.  It was the result of his biting off line, year after year.  I couldn't look at him without thinking of my sister saying "Never use your teeth as tools."  Apparently he'd not heard that, and as a result he wore his love of fishing in his smile.

We become what we do over the years.  Let it be a look you'll love.

The Bravery of Relationship

People are messy.
When I'm asked about my theoretical foundation for therapy, that's my answer.  I'm not being trite.  People are messy, they do the best they can, and they show up with all their strengths and weaknesses if they do truly show up. And by them, I of course mean us.  All of us.


Psychologist David Snartch, an author of some really interesting books on relationship, talks about the tension between our desire for intimacy and our ability to tolerate it.  We want to be known, then flinch at the nakedness that involves.  It's hard to both preserve our tender egos and reveal our tender souls.  Thus relationship become the crucible where self becomes fully formed.  But crucibles are fiery and dangerous by nature, and in fear we withdraw to protect.


"A ship is safe in harbor, but that's not what ships are for", said William Shedd.   By taking the risk to stay present even when we fear our whole self will not be loved, we can reach depths in relationship that unavailable in solitude.  By taking the time to show our throats when we are scared and to deeply listen when we are tender, our hearts and souls can grow.

There is a reason for metaphors referring to the bonds of relationship.  Ties that bind us can provide safety even as they engender responsibility and discomfort.  We get connection, and it does come at the cost of staying seen and close.  Sometimes that can feel like too much.  But there is nothing like sharing a history with someone who has been there for you, warts and all; someone who has seen you at your worst and still remembers your best.  All of it is truly a difficult bargain.   We can try to be a rock, but we long for water, and relationship can slake our thirst.  Our job is to tolerate the discomfort of being whole with another.  I think the payoffs are worth it.

Resolution #31: Create a Map for Your Destination

First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do.  --Epitetus

    This is it-- the final day of the 31 days of resolutions.  Thanks to you that have made this journey with me.  It was fun and challenging to make a decision and stick to it even when other things tried to distract me.  Now it's time to get to work on putting these words into practices.

The vision must be followed by the venture.  It is not enough to stare up the steps - we must step up the stairs.     --Vance Havner


The month's grand finale' is to craft a visual inspiration for your 2011 goals.  Known as vision or dream boards, these tools serve to provide inspiration and reminders to your intentions for your life.

If you don't know where you are going, you will probably end up somewhere else. --Lawrence J. Peter

The steps:
Get a large piece of cardboard or posterboard. 
Gather up some old magazines.  If you don't have any, there's usually places in town where you can find them free or cheap.  Here in Corvallis, the local Folk Thrift store keeps a stack of donated mags near the exit door.
Clip out pictures that signify what it is you want in your life.  These can be concrete or abstract.  For example, you might choose a beautiful forest scene to remind you to practice your shinrin-yoku, or as a connotation of increased relaxation.  Perhaps you've decided to increase your fitness or lower your impact on the environment and place a picture of someone walking or bicycling.
Add words, if you wish, to emphasize or expand your choices.  
Place your vision board in an area you can see it regularly.  Spend a few moments each day or week to remind yourself of your intentions.

If you get intimidated by this process, an alternative is to simply place the pictures and words into a container.  You still need to get them out and look at them once in a while to help your focus.  Thanks to my dear friend Peggy for encouraging me in this last resolution.  She suggests that if you're more into the 3 dimensions, you may want to have a table where you can place objects in addition to pictures.

I've said before I'm not a big fan of books and films promoting the idea that one gets desires and needs met simply by wishing them.  But I do think we have a lot better chance of getting where we are going when we have a destination in mind.  Refining our goals cognitively and visually keeps us intention and aware.  Maybe the universe will meet us halfway or maybe we get there mostly on our own.  But when we are paying attention, we are much more likely to find what we are looking for.

It is never too late to be who you might have been.  ~George Eliot

Resolution #30: Resist Reactivity

I got to Oregon indirectly.  I fell in love with the Willamette Valley while visiting a hospitalized friend many, many years ago.  He'd been severely injured in an auto accident.  I stayed a few weeks as he drifted in and out of coma and slowly began his recovery from a traumatic brain injury.  I knew then that this was where I wanted to live.  He came to visit us a few years after we moved here, long after his accident.  We went to eat at  Nearly Normal's, a local restaurant.  It was an appropriate choice.  During the meal we talked about our lives over the ensuing years.  When I told him a funny story, his laughter filled the room. When I talked about hardships, so did his tears.  His intense reactions were so unusual that a waiter came to ask him if everything was all right.  He replied earnestly:  "Don't worry, it's just brain damage."

A common sequela of brain injury is a "emotional disinhibition", or lack of  squelching of our full emotional range.  But the truth is, there's a big variation in individual emotional expression.  Some of us are pretty contained.  Our ecstatic and our distressed don't look all that different.  Maybe I shouldn't say "us" here-- I have a much larger range.  Think of it like singing-- some people have a musical range (distance between the lowest and highest note they can sing) of maybe an octave and a half.  Others may have four, even five.  Everything in between is pretty much average. 

Back to our subject.  Our emotional reactivity-- or range-- can get us in big trouble.  If we underreact to important things (think denial, numbness), we get in trouble.  But more often, it is our over-reaction that causes harm.  We think the worst and suffer in advance about consequences that never happen.  We are sure we cannot withstand discomfort than in hindsight we barely remember.

Here's the visual I use with clients.   I call it the Drama Dial.   Think of a meter like the top 50% of a clock.  Imagine it divided into thirds.  On the left side is numbness, coldness, deadness.  But when we are dysregulated, we are usually way over on the far third.  We feel crazy, anxious, fiery.  Our thoughts and behaviors are impulsive and disorganized. Our goal at this time should be to get back to the middle.  I picture the Dalai Lama, with his incredibly peaceful smile.  He looks like a bomb could go off and he would say-- hmm, that was loud.

The goal is that sort of compassionate observation, without reactivity. 

And this is the vision.  To get to Door Number Two, that place in the middle where we can with calm curiosity look at the messes we are making.  And we can decide on new paths. 

When you are thinking of making changes in your life, and are filled with dread and discomfort, imagine yourself dialing things back down.  Imagine you are the eye in the hurricane, watching all the fearsome action but filled with still and quiet.  Observe your narrative about your fears of change, your clinging to Known.  Like the Dalai Lama, look at yourself with total love and compassion.  Forgive yourself for the disasters of your emotional thinking and open your heart to the possibility of positive change.

One to go!
Many, many thanks to you who have written comments about this 31 day journey.  They have lifted my spirit and kept me moving.
Jana
Today's vid:

Resolution #29: Respect The Intention of Your Resistance

This one may sound like a puzzler.  But a big reason we can have a hard time changing is because of that baby in the bathwater.  In other words, many of the harmful things we do have a positive intention or a pleasurable immediate effect.  It's the implementation or its aftereffects that get us in trouble.

We avoid something because it makes us anxious.  Wanting to be less anxious is a reasonable intention.  But when we have it hanging over our heads, we get guilt, shame, sometimes increased costs and troubles-- and in the end, more anxiety.  Identifying what we give up by changing, whether it's momentary anxiety or future unknowns, can help us address resistance factually or by developing new skills.

Many persons struggling with obesity don't fully recognize their intentions of holding onto excess weight.  Getting to a healthier weight can be about more than giving up the easy comfort and quick dopamine hits of certain foods.  It may mean facing sexual attention, dealing with anxiety around intimacy, or losing an excuse for avoiding life changes put off until that extra weight is gone.

Similarly, most things we say we want entail not only gains, but losses.  Sometimes the loss is just predictability.  Sometimes it is more.  Figure out what your resistance wants, and see if you can find a healthy way to replace the intention without the troublesome behavior. 

Resolution #28: Acknowledge and Challenge Resistance

Note:  Not my art.  Wish it was. Thank you to Glenn for tracking down the artists, Alex Koplin and David Melkejohn..  Keep them in art supplies by purchasing the print and get more info on their work at  h34dup.com  

OK-- back to work.  Three to go!  Finishing off the month with ways to improve our chances of making those resolutions, we have today's topic:  why it's so hard to change.

In a previous post, I talked about brain's desire to hang onto to instant dopamine hits as a reason we don't change.  Of course, it's not that simple.  We want things to be different, really we do.  But despite our intentions, we end up back in the same old places.  There are other forces at work besides chemistry.  A chief one:  we prefer predictible crap to the unknown.

Imagine you are standing at a cliff.  Wait-- make that clinging, very uncomfortably.  If you let go, maybe you fly and land in a much better place.  But maybe you just crash to a very messy end.
When faced with the big Don't Know, we tend to tell very scary stories.  The plane will crash, the relationship will end with not only a broken heart but a painful divorce.  We won't get the interview and will end up living under the bridge. 

Occasionally, parts of the story may be true.  Things may not work out exactly the way we hope, especially if we have unrealistic expectations of perfection.  Life is messy.  But rarely do they end as badly as we imagine when we can't even bring ourselves to try.  Still, to protect ourselves, sometimes we can't even get as far as beginnning to make the changes that might possibly lead us to happiness.  We repeat the same behaviors, sometimes hoping for a different ending, and sometimes just addicted to predictable ones. 

Tomorrow's post will talk about what we fear giving up.  But today, look at just the fear.  Spend a little time looking at ways you sabotage your own success.  Question whether you are trading comfort for happiness.

Related post:  What Anxiety Wants is Predictability

And instead of a song, today we have a poem.  Cheesy but powerful!

Autobiography in 5 short chapters
By Portia Nelson

I
I walk down the street
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk
I fall in
I am lost… I’m helpless
It isn’t my fault
It takes forever to find a way out

II
I walk down the same street
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk
I pretend I don’t see it
I fall in again
I can’t believe I am in the same place
But, it isn’t my fault
It still takes a long time to get out

III
I walk down the same street
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk
I see it is there
I still fall in… it’s a habit
My eyes are open
I know where I am
It is my fault
I get out immediately

IV
I walk down the same street
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk
I walk around it

V
I walk down another street

Resolution #27: Don't Feed Ethel

Most of us have a loud and annoying bully in our head who tells us Bad Scary Stuff.  I've decided to name it "Ethel".  Please forgive me if you are or have an Ethel in your life that you love.

Ethel says things like:  "You can't do it.  You're a loser.  Why try?  You don't deserve to (fill in the blank:  be happy, healthy, out of debt, in a good relationship)."  She tells lots of scary stories with an authority that is quite convincing.  Ethel gets bigger and stronger every time you listen to her.  

Today's resolution:  Don't feed Ethel.   

When that doubting voice shows up, don't even bother talking back.  It's OK to talk to yourself. Tip:  Unless you're alone, don't do it out loud.

Tell yourself: "That's just Ethel, doing her deal."  Tell yourself some facts, like "I've been scared before and done fine anyway."  Or "I don't really know how this will turn out, and I won't know anything more if I don't try."  When Ethel has no attention, she tends to wander off.

----------

Extraneous news:

Four more to go!  I can taste the relief.  Here's a couple of comments sent to me today about the 31-day challenge thus far.  I appreciate comments and conversation.  Don't be shy!

Erica, a lovely local therapist, wrote:

I read your blog this morning...  Here are a couple thoughts you engendered for me:

     When temptation is at hand...

Sometimes I think of future self as tomorrow's self (which helps that immediate gratification self latch onto something close at hand), so I ask "what will I, tomorrow, look back and thank me, today, for doing right now to get closer to that goal. 

    Sometimes, the best I can do is "damage control"--i.e. to take a hard day or down mood and at least not make it worse with dysfunctional cognitions or behaviors.  "Damage control" reminds me that not making it worse is sometimes the most positive thing I can accomplish.  Then surely the next morning I look back and thank myself for "not making it worse."  Make sense?

And my great pal Hal, who designed my pretty work website, wrote:

Miss Jana,
Hearty congrats on your sustained resolution to write January Resolutions... To ease you into February, for yer remaining 5...consider, please, if you will:
* Resolution #27: Find an Answer to All the Giraffe Ennui
* Resolution #28: Stay Away From Those Taco Bell-Bottom Trousers
* Resolution #29: Embrace Your Inner Bingo; Polka Nights
* Resolution #30: If You See That Fork in the Road, Take It
* Resolution #31: Sing the Body Electric...But Wear Rubber-Soled Shoes, Eh?
Your indentured servant,
Wally Ferblunghit

----

For more Hal and some good reads, check out his website:  http://hdklopper.net/ 

Today's musical vid:

Resolution #26: Set Reasonable Goals

Got Goals?
The average New Year's goals are big and nebulous.  Lose weight, get fit, get solvent, be happy.  The goals are great; it's the objectives that are missing.  Think of goals as the endpoint and objectives as yardlines, or markers on the way.  You need some sort of feedback that you're making progress and the goal is acheivable to keep up your momentum.

Goals can be lofty and large, but objectives need to be concrete and measureable.  Want to get fit?  How will you know when you are?  What will it take to get you there?  These smaller steps are your guideposts, and meeting them keeps you from getting discouraged and giving up.  If you are currently a couch potato and want to be a runner, you don't start by signing up for the Boston Marathon.  You start by getting off the couch and getting around the block. 

I know I have told this story before, but it bears repeating.  Long term goals are like a lighthouse.  We may never get there, but if we are heading toward the light, and reorient when we find ourselves stumbling around in the dark, we are going in the right direction.  How do you know when you are in the light?

To use this resolution, pick a long term goal.  Write it down.  Then find two or three small changes you can make that show you are heading the right direction and commit to them.  Alternately or additionally, each day notice anything you did that supports your goal.  For example, if you want to be more ecologically conscious, maybe today you walked to work, ate local food for lunch, and went to the library instead of purchasing that magazine.  Writing down what you did will trigger you to remain more intentional in your behavior.  If you say "I am going to use my treadmill an hour a day tomorrow" and then find yourself avoiding it, start by just dusting it off and turning it on to see it still works.  Maybe set a goal for walking on it for two minutes.  Most likely you will decide to do three and see you've already met and exceeded your goal.  Focusing on what you did right is more encouraging that despairing about what you haven't yet done. If you are feeling overwhelmed by your goal, it's too big.  What's the smallest step of incremental change that will be an improvement?  Try that a bit and you will probably exceed it.  Your success will reinforce your efforts. 

5 more to go!
Jana

Resolution #25: Listen to what Future Self wants

 My New Year's resolution-- to write a blog each day in January about resolutions-- is close to being met.  Whew! I am feeling proud.  At times I have the attention span of a fruit fly and the discipline of a labrador puppy.   I surprised myself by sticking to it. These last few posts will be about bettering your chances of making changes and moving toward the life you want.

Every January, about 45% of Americans resolve to better themselves in one or more ways.  Over a third of that group never even get started.  Most of the rest give up before meeting their goals.  According to Lauran Neergaard, AP medical writer, our brains are hard-wired to respond quickly to immediate rewards, and that's what most bad habits offer us. Future self wants to retire with savings, but present self needs to get that upgraded IPad. Future self may want to be thin, but present self really, really wants another slice of pie.   And that instant hit of dopamine from pie in the mouth is a lot more tangible than pie in the sky.


To help motivate yourself, get a better picture of where you want to be.  It's a lot easier to get somewhere you want if you have a destination in mind.

If your long term goal is a big one, picture the results.  Then ask yourself what you can do today to walk in that direction.  When temptation is at hand, ask future self what it wants-- then distract, refocus, or find some less-harmful way to hit that reward system.

More on goal setting tomorrow--
Today's song by the luminous Karen Savoca.

Find more artists like Karen Savoca & Pete Heitzman at Myspace Music

Resolution #24: Make A Joyful Noise

 Continuing on our increasing happiness theme...
I woke up today just a little off.  There were some reasons:  a good friend had come and gone from a visit; I'd had a packed weekend with friends, family and nurturance and now it was Monday and I'd overbooked my schedule for the week.  I was having trepidation over how I was going to juggle all the plates in motion for the week.

One of my (many gorgeous, brilliant and multifaceted) sisters recently wrote:

"My joie de vivre has had me accused of both being phony and erratic.(A colleague) even told me to stop putting crack in my cereal. ;) To the doubters- let me assure you, my happiness (to paraphrase Seinfield) is real, and it's spectacular."  When a reader inquired as to the secret of her perennial cheeriness, she said she thought it was innate-- that joy was her default. Though I also know she moves continuously toward joy and positive thinking, I think she is right.  Her temperament is naturally happy.  You can see it in her baby pictures-- sunny, smiling ear to ear.  I don't think I got the same set of genes.  In my childhood photos, I have sort of a perennially worried or distracted look. Even though I have a good love of fun, my genes seem to push me more toward introversion, introspection and sometimes melancholia.  I appear to need to be much more intentional to stay cheery.

Since about 1976, research supported the idea that we have a happiness set-point-- a baseline we return to after attempting to increase it with a big change or inflow of stuff/cash.  But newer research has challenged this idea.  The brain is much more pliable than once thought-- at every age.  And as pointed out in this week's blogs, we can move our set-point with community, gratitude, laughing, smiling, and feelings of personal agency.  

So how did I move mine today?

Singing!  I intentionally sang all the way to work, the happiest songs I could think of.  "When You Wish Upon a Star", yesterday's blog theme "You've Got a Friend In Me", and "Zip-a-dee Doo-dah".  And even without my rational support, I was in a good mood.  I sang between sessions, I sang all the way home, I sang making dinner.

Music can soothe the savage breast, and the cranky or melancholic one too.  Of course, music can change moods in many ways.  It can move us to tears, sad or other; it can raise tension.  There are whole industries based on using music to manipulate mood and behavior (think Muzak).  Even listening to sad music is helpful to mood overall-- it helps us identify and process emotional material, allowing it to move and shift.  But if you are wanting to lift your mood, put on something cheery and toe-tapping and be a curious observer to the results.

More reading:  Exploring the Musical Brain

 

Resolution #23: Encourage Community

Feeling isolated?  You're--so to speak-- not alone.  Despite our fat facebook friends lists, Americans are spending less time in group and individual interactions and counting fewer people as confidantes than in previous history.  We work more, move more, attend church and civic groups less, volunteer less, walk less.  We have fewer sidewalks and front porches, all which used to encourage us to bump into our neighbors.  We watch videos and streaming concerts instead of attending theaters and live music.  In general, our places of worship, schools and other commnunity gathering sites are larger and usually outside of our immediate neighborhood.  Our banks and grocery stores are owned by anonymous corporations who don't know us or our individual needs.  All of this results in feelings of isolation and anonymity.

If positivity research is a bit muddy on some things, it is in consensus on one:  social connectedness increases happiness and health.  A meta-analysis of nearly 150 studies found strong links between mental and physical wellness and feeling tied to community.  Read a NYTimes article about it here.

For this resolution, do a social inventory.  How many people in your extended family, neighborhood and community did you connect in the last seven days?  How can you increase it this week?  And what is one thing you can do to increase connectivity within your community?

There's so many ways to work on this resolution.  Spend more time in your front yard, and greet your neighbors.  Volunteer.  Throw a potluck.  Call or write an old friend or family member.  Need more?
150 things you can do to build social capital: from bettertogether.org.

Related posts:  CONNECT
Nourished by Community

Today's song:

Resolution #22: Have a Good Belly Laugh

 Laughter really is good medicine.
A good belly laugh releases stress, lowers blood pressure and cholesterol, and increases immune activity. It provides health benefits similar to taking a jog (though perhaps without the calorie loss-- so don't completely take to the couch). 

Laughter connects us to others, reduces social and internal tensions, shifts perspective in positive ways, and relaxes our bodies for long after we stop giggling.  And most of the time, it's free!

Humor is an individual thing, and what some find funny others will find offensive or just dumb.  With that caution in mind, here's some web resources to get you going:
Funny or Die videos
The Onion News
Tweet Me Harder Podcast
The Institute of Official Cheer

 For a brainy look at laughter, listen to Radio Lab's Laughter episode.


Today's video is an intro to laughter yoga.