On a Limb with Claudia

Day Five: Mini-Selfkindness Course

Day Five: Self Kindness Mini-Course
Today's conversation is a little complicated. Settle in and lets see if we can make some sense of this.

WE ARE NOT VERY GOOD AT SEEING REALITY

Let's face it. We are capable of seeing in a very small band of light. In fact, many people estimate that we cannot see over 90% of matter. (This is called "Dark Matter.") This just a fact.

Can you accept that we can only see in a small band of light?

Police departments take thousands of photo graphs of crime scenes because investigators cannot see everything. Investigators spend hours looking at photos of what they could not see at the scene.

Can you accept that good, talented investigators use photographs to see what they cannot?

Here's the thing -- YOU ARE NOT SEEING YOURSELF CLEARLY.

We use memories, experiences, training, and social trends to make choices about ourselves and our future.

The problem is this -- our memories, experiences, training, and social trends are not reality.

SO WHAT?

This thing you beat yourself up about is likely not real or true. It's something you heard or thought or believed. Women who were thin hated themselves when Marilyn Monroe was popular, but when Twiggy was the rage, women who were more curvy loathed their curves.

When you look at yourself, you see how fat you are or stupid or crazy or needy or... fill in the blank.

What's your evidence?
Is it's true?
How do you know that it's true?
Are you sure?

These things you hold against yourself are not real.

THESE THINGS YOU HOLD AGAINST YOURSELF ARE NOT REAL.

Maybe, just maybe, you weren't seeing that situation correctly. Maybe you simply got it wrong.

(Breathe. Don't panic. You'll be okay. Just breathe.)

How can you be kind to a stinker such as yourself?

You are a whole complicated human being. You have some great attributes. You suck in some ways. You are human -- good, bad, stupid, smart. Being alive means being everything at the same time.

I ask -- how can you NOT be kind to your imperfect human self?

Day Four: Self Kindness Mini-Course

Day Four: Self Kindness Mini-Course
When I was twenty, I went to Northern Ireland where my family is from. It was in the middle of the troubles. I bumbled along there. As an American, it was hard to find real, true information about what was going on. I made mistakes.

At one point, I went to a bakery where I said something -- I'm not even sure what. Everyone in the bakery cleared out and this man appeared. He was terrifying. He told me to leave and not come back. He was not cruel or mean. Just firm -- and terrifying.

On my way back to the states, I learned that he was one of the big wigs in the PIRA, if not THE head of the PIRA.

For more than twenty years, this story brought me incredible shame. I was so naive, so stupid. How could I have been so stupid?? How could I have possibly so stupid? So humiliating.

I know that you have stories like this.

You misfired. Screwed up. You were awkward. Stupid even. You aren't even sure what you wanted but you bumbled into something and, while it didn't kill you, you make damn sure you remember that you did this thing.

We can spend a lot of time talking about shame but people like Brene Brown do this much better. She unwinds the entire process. If you haven't read her books, they are good.

We're here to feel better, to find what works, and to learn how to be kind to ourselves.

HOW CAN WE BEGIN TO FEEL BETTER?

The first thing to remember is that your brain is in a loop. It's not healing or growing from this experience. You need to stop.

Here are somethings that help:

1. Earlier this week, Lindsi Simicich Dennis shared that she says out loud "NO!" to stop her mind loops. This is a great time to use this technique. A hearty "NO" will stop your mind from unraveling.

2. What is the statue of limitations on that event? No really. Murderers get 25 to life. MURDERERS. There is no life sentence on being naive. There's no life sentence on any of the things you continually hold against yourself. Ask yourself -- how long have I going to held this against myself? Be honest. It's likely to be more than someone would be sentenced for murdering someone. Isn't it time to let that go?

3. Forgive yourself. Being human means we do a lot of stupid things. We try but we screw up a lot. Every single one of us messes up on a daily basis. It takes a little work, but the easiest way I've found to learn to forgive yourself is through Jack Kornfield's Forgiveness Meditation. You must first forgive yourself before you can start to forgive others.

We cannot be kind to ourselves while we continue to crucify ourselves for being human. Self kindness comes from embracing our humanity and realizing, as Maya Angelou said, "When you know better, you do better."

Day Three: Self Kindness Mini-Course

Day Three: Self Kindness Mini-Course

Today, we take a look at exactly who is the inner-tyrant living inside you. And why do we all have one, precious.

Around the age of three years old, we begin to internalize messages. Some people call this the birth of the "ego," but that's tricky because stuck up people have big egos, etc. To save confusion, I like to call this our inner-tyrant.

WE ALL HAVE THEM -- EVERY SINGLE ONE OF US.

So think about it -- what was going on in your family life when you were three years old? Feel free to ask your parents. This one factor will give you a clue into the personality of your inner-tyrant.

You see, your inner-tyrant is three years old. It cannot cook or work or tie its shoes. It cannot go to the market, have a conversation (that makes any sense), or live the life of an adult. It's three year old.

Before we get to why or what function your inner-tyrant is serving, it's important to ask -- how do you treat a three year old?

Boundaries. Kindness. Lots of love. Focus on the emotions; ignore the words. How would you treat a three year old?

Why do we have this creature inside, precious? To keep us safe. That's it.

What does your inner-tyrant do? S/he keeps you safe. That's it.

When your inner-tyrant goes off, you have done something your inner-tyrant thinks is dangerous.

WHAT'S THE BEST WAY TO DEAL WITH AN INNER TYRANT? How would you treat a three year old?

There's a lot of words that can fill up page after page here. But honestly, it's fairly simply.

Things that work? "Okay, I hear you." "You're right this is scary." "We're okay." "Everything's okay." "Be still." You will find something else that works for you and your inner-tyrant. If you have something now, drop it into the comments.

In this time, it's important to note that narcissism and borderline personality are thought to develop due to an injury to a three year old psyche -- or the inner-tyrant.

What do you think? What works for you?

Day Two: Self Kindness Mini-Course.

Day Two: Self Kindness Mini-Course.
I thought it might be good to talk about how to feel better when you're caught in self rage rather than explain why we have self-loathing, blah, blah, blah. In many ways, it doesn't really matter WHY we have these issues. "Whys" are important. We'll talk about them tomorrow.

If you're like me and jump to the "How" of everything. This is a good lesson for you.

Let's jump right in. Self-rage is literally a loop in the brain. Your brain is a physical organ. When we are caught in a thought, our brain is looping. The more the brain loops on a thought, the more often the brain will loop on that thought.

So what can we do?

When we catch ourselves in any loop -- self rage, anger at someone or something, obsessive thoughts, whatever your particular brain does -- all we need to do is distract ourselves.

From the off, you should know it will feel better, more familiar, more comfortable, to stay in that stinking, sinking brain loop. This is why people keep using drugs, alcohol, etc.

We continue to do self harm (and yes, self rage is self harm) because it feels good, familiar, and safe, as well as awful.

Today, I'm going to teach you a technique I used to teach to psychiatrists and medical professionals. One of the psychiatrists I taught with used to say -- "This technique distracts the brain from anything it's doing. This is why it works." The truth is that no one knows why it works. Distraction? Maybe. Chinese medicine has other answers. We simply do not know enough about the body to know why this works.

We just know that it works.

Okay, look at the photo I included. Do you see that this man is touching his face? When we feel shame, we usually touch our face. This is an automatic reaction that we aren't aware that we're doing. This is where we start.

***In time of Covid-19, please wash your hands first.****

NEED IT FAST AND EASY?
Feel self-rage? Try rubbing or tap the space under your nose. Most people feel better. This is something you can do in public (if your hands are clean).

READY TO CHANGE?
The technique I wanted to talk about is called EFT or Emotional Freedom Technique. It was invented by Gary Craig. Since his death, there's been a lot of people teaching and selling this technique.

I have personally seen people move rapidly through their issues using this technique. Sometimes, they move so fast that they terrify themselves. Be warned. I've seen it used on prison populations and cause enormous change.

The technique is easy and free. You don't need to go down the rabbit hole of expensive seminars. You can do this at home, in the bathroom, or your car. It's easy.

What is it? It involves using your finger to tap specific places on your face and torso. The idea is that stuck issues = stuck energy in the body.

I like the EFTWizard or Brad Yates , who has been posting free EFT videos on YouTube for a very long time. If you have the time or interest, poke around on his page. There's a lot there. Here's a list of my favorite videos for this issue:

Something you hate about yourself
Beating yourself up
Resistance to Loving Yourself

IF THAT'S TOO WEIRD FOR YOU:
You need to retrain your brain.
1. A lot of people use mantras or prayers to break a brain loop.
"This too shall pass."
"I am a beloved child of God."
"I am made of star dust."
"May I be filled with Loving Kindness..." (that's the loving kindness meditation.)
"I am loved. I am safe. I am free."

2. Move your body. My only caveat is that if we're truly caught in a brain loop we may spend the entire time thinking about it. Further, there's lots of self rage in a lot of workouts.

3, Distract your mind with beauty. Have you ever noticed that people who spend a lot of time in nature then not to be so angry with themselves? Nature heals. Even just looking at beautiful pictures or paintings can work. Calm.com does a great job with this. So does Google Art and Culture (https://artsandculture.google.com/) go for a walk through Petra or any of the museums. You'll feel better.

Is there something that works for you? What's a mantra or prayer that works for you? Let me know in the comments.

Tomorrow, we'll talk about that inner-tyrant.
Hopefully, this helps.

A return to kindness with a mini-course on Self-KIndness

Returning to Kindness posts:

I asked my Facebook friends if they would like me to return to posting about kindness. Overwhelmingly, people asked to see kindness again. A few people who know me well asked if I could do a little teaching about kindness. After thinking about all of their comments, I decided that I would continue the kindness posts and include mini-teaching weeks.

This week, I thought we could look at being kind to ourselves. There's a lot of conversation about "self-care" and very little conversation about self kindness.

What is the difference? Self care usually involves some kind of product -- massages or bath bombs or special wine or... Much of this is not available now that we are staying at home.

Self kindness is the conscious act of being kind to yourself; learning to cut yourself some slack.

Very simply, living a kind life begins with being kind to yourself.

Our first lesson in self kindness is simply admitting that sometimes, you get screaming, raging angry with yourself.

Everyone does this. We internalize messages from parents, teachers, and media. In order to sell us stuff, we're told over and over and over again -- by sophisticated manipulators -- that we aren't good enough. The only solution to getting good enough is to buy buy buy.

We buy and buy and still, we are left feeling angry with ourselves and feeling inadequate.

So what actually works?

Over the course of this week, I will share with you things I learned from fifteen years of working with clients and my own therapy as well as what I learned in my Master's program. These things work, if you're willing to simply admit that there's something going on inside you.

For today, I ask you to contemplate the idea that you might be really, really angry with yourself. Tomorrow, we'll talk about what to do about it.

I don't have some webinar I'm selling. I am not in this so that you can sooth your self loathing through credit card purchases. I'm here because some of you knew me well enough to ask.

Feel free to leave a comment. If it's too sensitive, send me a DM.

What have I learned after more than a year of Everyday Kindness?

A little more than a year ago, I looked around the world and saw only aggression, anger, and despair. I was in the early days of healing from spine surgery. I was awake less than six hours a day, and when I was awake, I was sick to my stomach. While I was desperately ill, the world had fallen into rage.

One day, I was in the supermarket. I was in my back brace and carrying a cane. I watched an elderly African-American woman try to check out. She went from line to line where she was pushed out of the way. The manager saw her struggle and opened a register to help her. Rather than let the jerks push her out, I followed her like a wall. She was shaking head to toe in fear of these "busy" people. I stood behind her like a log jam. The impatient and rude made comments, sighed angrily, but they were simply unable to get anywhere near her. She gave me a soft smile and a nod when she finished her transaction. I let the tide flow.

As far as I could tell, the zero-sum game and its twin, righteous rage, seemed to have won the day.

I wasn't able to march. I wasn't awake long enough to do much of anything, really. 

I noticed that it was Random Act of Kindness Week. I realized what I could do.

I could post about Kindness on social media every day. 

Because I was so ill it took a while to set everything up. By March 2017, I was posting daily to Instagram, Google +, Twitter, LinkedIn, and, of course, Facebook. I set up a new Everyday Kindness website to hold all of the posts. There's even an email list for people who'd like to get a Kindness post in their email every day. 

Kindness is something I've thought about for a long time. In 2006, I ran Simply Kind Tuesdays on this blog. Everyday Kindness was a website about kindness. Kindness is something that's interesting to think about, but hard to keep up. After a few years, I let it all lag. 

It was waiting for me to pick up again in February 2017.

Every Sunday for the last year, I've created daily posts and scheduled them through programs.

The idea was to remind people to be kind. Some of the posts are plain dumb. Many of the posts are beautiful. A few of them are profound. My hope was that somewhere among all of the kind insanity, individuals would find a way to be kind. In the moment-to-moment living of life, these posts might just help.

I believe that we all want to be kind. In fact, often we believe we are being kind -- even when we're not. 

Here's what I've learned from a year of posting about Kindness every single day:

1. The beautiful posts are the most popular. A simple "Be Kind" on a lovely post is much more popular than complicated quotes or ideas. People simply do not have enough beauty in their lives. These posts seemed to break through in ways other posts don't.
   
   
2. There aren't that many quotes about kindness, and mostly they are dumb.  Kindness is love in action. There simply aren't great quotes about love in action, likely because of the action part. Kindness is doing not talking.
   
   
3. If you post of about kindness, you get to see a lot more kindness in your timeline. When you talk about what's important to you, you see reflected back to you what's important to you. While this may be a law of metaphysics, it is certainly how social media timelines work. 
   
   
4. Kindness is the work of warriors. Kindness is hard. It's much easier to be angry, rage-filled, or stupid. It takes concerted effort to be kind. A lot of concerted effort, in fact. And...
   
   
5. Kindness disarms even the biggest bully and most Internet trolls.  I know that it's hard to believe. I know that it's much easier to mock, belittle, or engage a troll. And sure, people are stupid. Many of them are deserving of your rage. But if you really want to mess with the trolls in your life, be kind to them. Kindness is disarming. You'll be surprised.
   
   
6. The research into Kindness is incredible. Perpetrating kind acts decreases anxiety. Kind acts increase one's sense of well-being. Check out the Kind Lab for great articles about how your life changes when you are kind.

 

Kindness is hard wired into human beings. 

Cooperation, collaboration, and teamwork are among the fundamental reasons that human beings have survived to colonize the globe. 

The truth is that we cooperate more than we don't. Most of the time, we follow the rules of law. When times are tough, we band together to support each other. Every religion calls to us to be kind. 

This should give us hope. 

This crazy, zero-sum, rage fueled time will pass. 

We can help it pass through our every day acts of kindness. 

Simply Kind Tuesdays: You spent how much on hate?

I received this table in my inbox. It reflects the spending statistics for the state of Wisconsin.

It doesn't really matter who spent what on which attack ad.

What matters to me is that more than ten million dollars has been or will be spent on advertisements and hate.

  GroupAttack ad spending National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC)$1,717,581.00 U.S.Chamber of Commerce (not your local Chamber)$2,047,863.00 Americans for Prosperity (backed by the Koch brothers)$1,998,067.00 Crossroads GPS (Karl Rove's group)$3,939,029.00 The 60+ Association (whose spokesperson is Pat Boone)$520,800.00 NFIB$145,587.00 TOTAL$10,833,445.00

Almost eleven million dollars? In one small state alone?

What could almost eleven million dollars could to fight child hunger in this country?

What if that almost eleven million dollars was spent on a new start-up business in Wisconsin? Imagine how many jobs could be created.

Imagine what almost eleven million dollars could do for Wisconsin schools? or the inner city parks? or the gorgeous Wisconsin open spaces and public land?

What if almost eleven million dollars was split up among neighborhood associations throughout Wisconsin?

All of this money bought thousands of minutes to broadcast hate within Wisconsin. There's no telling (literally) how much money has been spent to purchase minutes to broadcast hate through out the country.

Hate is not going to solve our problems.

Hate will never make us happy.

Hate only breeds more hate. With this kind of financial backing, there's no telling what this kind of hate will create.

What can we do?

 

• We can turn off the television and radio when hate is on.

 

 

•  We can turn our attention to kindness.

 

 

• When we hear hate, we can give love either in the form of a quiet prayer for the hater or simply saying the loving kindness mediation.

 

It's not easy.

Nothing worthwhile is.

But no one's coming to fix this.

It's up to us to stop this madness before we are eaten alive by our own hatred.

Simply Kind Tuesdays : What is your religion?

In every religion, God wants us to be kind:

"Kindness is a mark of faith, and whoever is not kind has no faith." (Muslim(sic) from the Quran)

~~

"A religious act is performed out of good motivation with sincere thought for the benefit of others. Religion is here and now inour daily lives. If we lead that life for the benefit of the world, this is the hallmark of a religious life.

This is my simple religion. No need for temples. No need for complicated philosophy. Your own mind, your own heart is the temple; your philosophy is simple kindness." His Holiness the Dalai Lama from How to Expand Love: Widening the Circle of Loving Relationships

~~

"Among the wealthy, compassionate men claim the richest wealth,

For material wealth is possessed by even contemptible men.

Find and follow the good path and be ruled by compassion.

For if the various ways are examined, compassion will prove the means to liberation." The Gayatri Mantra (Hindu)

Why is it so hard to remember?

 

Simply Kind Tuesdays : Just when it seems like people suck, a distracted woman falls onto the subway tracks in Boston.

Let's face it. It's the season of people shouting at the top of their lungs: "WE'RE RIGHT AND THOSE PEOPLE SUCK!"

Every time I turn around someone is telling me about how cruel, stupid, and small people are now. You hear it on the radio.  It blinks at you in Facebook advertisements, spots on Hulu, and anywhere they think you will listen.

This commentary is so ubiquitous that the lunatic fringe in Texas is sure the US President is going to turn the country over to UN Troops (whatever that is).

We're supposed to believe it.

You can really tell the nature of human beings by what they do without thinking. Watch what all of these people do when a distracted woman falls onto the train tracks with her 4 year old child. The action is in the beginning, so watch carefully.

This is raw footage. It has not been modified or changed in anyway.

Woman and child fall.

Without hesitation people help.

Notice the people closest to the camera. Too far away to actually help, they send care and concern to the woman, child, and helpers. When it's over, they check themselves, their child or companion, and move on with their day.

This is the true nature of human beings.

Too many of us are giving up, jumping off bridges, or hiding at home because we believe kindness has drained out of the world.

Don't buy the bullshit.

Humanity is pretty freakin' awesome. Lots of great things are going on. More people live in peace now that ever in the world's history.

If you get a chance, share this video. It might just make the difference in someone's day.

Simply Kind Tuesdays : Learning to be kind to ourselves.

Let's face it. On a good day, most of us only tolerate ourselves. Everyone's body should be something that it's not - fatter, thinner, more buxom or less buxom. We spend a lot of time pointing out other people's stupidity all the while hoping no one notices our own.

If you really want to change the world, change the way you feel about yourself.

But how?

Over the course of the next few months, I will share with you some good techniques which actually work to help you become more kind to yourself. Of course, the easiest technique is actually the hardest. So today, I thought I'd share with you something that is effective and fairly easy.

EFT

EFT stands for Emotional Freedom Technique and was created by Gary Craig. The idea came from the Chinese Medicine technique of acupuncture and more specifically acupressure and shiatsu. The premise behind acupuncture is that we have channels of energy (meridians) which flow through the body. When these channels get clogged up, we feel sickness, uncomfortability and pain.

Gary created a technique of tapping on the beginning of a few meridians while using our minds to focus on the problem. He has always given the manual away for free.

Since its introduction, EFT has become one of the "go to" techniques when traditional mental health techniques don't work. It's a fabulous technique for hard to treat problems such as post traumatic stress disorder and pain.

Here is my favorite EFT practitioner, Brad Yates. He has a YouTube channel with an EFT pattern for almost every kind of problem. In this video, Brad helps us deal with the things we hate about ourselves. It's 6 minutes long - and free. The only thing you have to lose is your own self loathing.