Mind Body Soul

Are people still on the New Year, New Me kick? Or have we moved past that and everyone’s back to being a dumpster fire?

I personally have never set a new year’s resolution. As an athlete I find them pointless. You should be working everyday to get better, no need to wait for some arbitrary date on the calendar. If 2020 taught us anything, and it taught us a lot — time ain’t shit.

I spent the last couple years really working on myself. I committed to really being single, really getting to the root of my traumas and really trying to love me - the good and the bad.

What I’ve learned is that it’s a whole ass journey. You can’t just go to therapy or just eat right. You can’t just go to the gym or cut out the toxic folks in your life. It’s a whole mind body soul vortex that takes a long time to get right.

My concoction of wellness is one part therapy, one part fitness, one part healthy eating, one part setting boundaries, and about 32 million parts dogs.

For me, weekly therapy as a consistent is really important. I find that even though I spend a lot of the time just talking through whatever I’m struggling with, it gives me persepctive and resets my anxiety about my own issues. I need a neutral party to remind me I’m not a piece of shit. I do. Sure, there are the activities and the homework and that’s all fine and good, but the 50 minutes with someone who is going to explain to me why I am the way I am and help me to develop my own peace with my past is life changing.

Fitness is a huge component of my overall well being. I have been an athlete since I was in the womb and if I go more than a day or two without movement, my body feels awful and my mind is a mess. Finding the balance of understanding fitness is about moving and not about weight has been a whole other bag of issues. It took me decades to understand that being active can mean a long walk, yoga, a run, a hike — it can be a thousand things. And it doesn’t have to be about losing weight or changing my phsyical appearance. It’s about allowing my body a moment to just move around and let those endorphins flow.

I should add that getting outside is also probably a huge piece of my sanity. Fresh air throughout the day makes me feel at peace. It reinvigorates my whole mood and makes me feel alive. It’s a game changer.

Healthy eating for me is another bag of issues. Growing up I ate really healthy. I had also started dieting by age 13 to try and make myelf a better athlete. My relationship with food is wild. Because I never really ate junk food until college, I have moments where I binge too much and feel guilty. I also have moments I deprive myself. None of that is healthy. The only way that I’ve been able to keep a healthy relationship with food is through cooking and prioritizing whole from the earth foods. That’s important to me. Cooking is theraputic for me too. Seeing what I can put into each meal gives me joy and helps me know what foods make me feel good. It’s ok to eat the junk at times — sometimes I want some ice cream — but when I am eating healthier, and not depriving myself, my body and mind feel stronger and my whole system operates at peak levels.

Setting boundaries - wow ok so it has taken me decades upon decades to figure out boundaries. Truth be told, this is where I struggle the most. Whether it’s human relationships to work — I am an extremes person. I’m all in or I’m all out. There’s no balance to me. And that’s not healthy either. Learning to have a life outside of work, to not expect that everyone has the same all in mentality as I do — that is a journey. And I think it always will be a journey for me. I don’t have a whole lot of enlightenment here, becasue I’m still learning what a boundary is and how to set one. It’s not intuitive to me. I hope it will be someday.

Lastly - when all else fails, when I’m completely out of alignment - I hug my dog. Nobody is going to love me so completely and without judgment like my dog will. And even if it’s just a quick snuggle, he resets my perspective and come on — who doesn’t love a little puppy love?

Mind Body soul connection is so real. It’s a whole mental, physical, spiritual combination that is different for every single one of us. What works for me is torture for you. What works for you is lunacy to me. But what I’ve really learned in 2020, after a whole year of spending a lot of time alone and growing, without that recipe for success — life sucks. And again, every blog is about 2020 which isn’t for everoyne - but it changed us all - and I for one want to come out of it a better person for myself first and the rest of the world second.

2020 showed us a lot of ugly, getting myself on a higher level is my first step towards helping the world get better.

Namaste

At pretty much every job I’ve worked at, there has been a high intensity on edge feeling. I’ve always felt stressed, worried, and have a really hard time stepping away from constantly thinking about work. It was a never ending worry about being fired, being in trouble, or being so overworked I could barely survive.

Obviously that greatly affected my personal life. I was constantly exhausted, irritable, antisocial, even depressed. My entire life revolved around my work and the people in it. It was all consuming. And I honestly thought that would be my life forever. I didn’t know any different in my 11 years of being a professional.

I’ve been in my new role for about 3 months. The other day I was sitting on my couch and I realized how calm I felt. I wasn’t thinking about work. Not an overwhelming project, not a difficult coworker, not an unreasonable boss. I was truly existing in the moment I was in.

Now I understand that the first few months, even years of a job can feel like the honeymoon stages. I’ve had that briefly in other roles so I’ve taken these feelings with a grain of salt. However, the culture I’m in and the people I’m surrounded by who embody that culture have given me hope that this will last.

During the week I have flexibility, independence, and people who care about how I’m doing both professionally and personally. I have the freedom to craft my own schedule (within reason), to say I’m overwhelmed without being told “that’s just how it works,” and I’ve got the time and energy to get out and have a thriving personal life.

I can breathe.

There’s time in my life to regroup, take a moment, and reconnect with my center.

In the 11+ years I’ve been a grown up in the working world, I’ve never experienced that. I’ve never had all the pieces fall together. I experimented with what I could tolerate. Could I endure harassment for my dream job? No. Could I work 24/7 for a company I loved? No. Could I put up with a bad boss for good pay? No.

Not everything aligns all the time. I don’t think all the parts have aligned for my current job, but the pieces that have aligned create a puzzle that I fit into. I love the company, the people, the boss - all those things make anything else extremely minuscule on the negative scale. I feel calm. I feel happy. I feel content. And while it all doesn’t create my “perfect” dream job I built up in my mind, it’s redefined what I define as working long term for me.

I cannot emphasize enough how important the feeling calm is to me. It seems so simple and many of you very well may experience it every day. But I haven’t. I haven’t felt that level of content with a career. Where you feel happy, challenged, like you matter, just all the pieces FIT.

Sure, we all complain about our jobs. I’m highly skeptical when folks don’t have one single complaint about their job. I don’t think the whole every single day is perfect life really exists. But if you truly feel happy and the good days outnumber the bad, that’s a huge win.

If you’re like me and your career journey is nontraditional, feeling calm is honestly the biggest win of them all. I encourage you to continue to look for that win. Continue to sacrifice, dream, work, and motivate yourself to stay positive. It’s not easy. It’s ups and downs and anything but simple. People will tell you that you’re stupid. They’ll laugh. They’ll question everything about you as a professional. But they are not you. They don’t live with the journey or the experience. What works for them, it’s not for you.

I don’t know if the calm will last. What I think is most important to remember while I am here is that it’s possible. It’s not a pipe dream. It’s not a decade of taking risks for nothing. It’s real and I’m holding it in front of me. Nobody can take the dream away from me because I know it’s there. And even if it doesn’t workout every time, it’s there. It’s real. And I can make it mine.

Diary of an Anxious Person, Part 328423

Prior to my recent commitment to therapy, I had in fact gone to therapy in the past. I had even gone on a semi regular basis at one point. But what I now know is that while you can physically go to therapy, unless you're willing to be truly open and honest, it doesn't mean anything.

So while I thought that I was working to find tools for managing my anxiety, I wasn't. I wasn't laying everything on the table and talking about past traumas nor opening up enough to really understand why I have anxiety and what triggers it.

More recently I've opened up to my therapist more than I ever have with anyone in life. And what I've begun to understand is that carrying my burdens on my own only makes my life harder. You cannot outrun your own story. Each experience shapes how you think, act, and feel. And until you start to talk about those things, you won't be able to control your own demons.

As a teenager and into my 20's, I was sick a lot. I was hospitalized, had multiple surgeries, and rarely felt healthy. That time was also when I experienced my greatest traumas and had my most unhealthy relationships. There's a link there I never took the time to understand. Doctors always told me my immune system was the problem. So I believed them. Realistically, what I was experiencing mentally was absolutely affecting how my body reacted physically.

There are numerous studies correlating mental and physical well being. It's not hippie voo doo philosophy, it's scientifically proven that what you think directly affects how your body feels. We see it in serious illnesses and we see it in mental illness. It's fact. Kind of like global warming folks. Stop pretending it's not a thing. It's a thing.

Back to me. The more I grow and take steps to manage my mental health, the more my physical health has responded. I used to get pneumonia/bronchitis every year without fail. The flu was something I experienced multiple times annually. Surgery used to be an annual tradition. I haven't had surgery since 2008. I just got pneumonia for the first time in probably 2 years. The flu? Don't know her. And I am a big believer that unburdening my past, trusting my therapist to help guide me with dealing with those things, has led my immune system to follow. I'm mentally healthier so I'm physically healthier too.

In fact - a month or so ago, when I was struggling with mental balance, I noticed my body was off too. I'm more in tune with this correlation so it's easier for me to adjust my self care to bring back more balance to my body.

For whatever reason, even when we are speaking with experts who's job it is to manage our mental and physical health, we lie. We hold back vital information. We are embarrassed to tell these professionals the entire truth. And that's absurd. Do you really think your doctor and your therapist haven't heard it all? Better yet, how do you expect to get a proper diagnoses with steps to healing if you're not being truthful about what you're going through? I get it, we all fear judgment. But we are all in that same boat. And we all have some weird times in our lives. The good news? Legally, these people have to keep your quirky behavior private. Even better news? Sharing all of that information with a professional, that literally relieves a huge weight from your chest.

I've had so many things to address with my therapist that I think I have held back less out of embarrassment and more out of pure exhaustion. I leave sessions emotionally and physically drained. It's not an easy process to be totally exposed with a stranger. The work and the pressure is entirely on me. She acts as a guide to take me to places I might never have gone to before, but it's 100% my responsibility to do the homework and take the steps to recovering and being healthier in the future.

I can't sugarcoat this part of therapy and living with mental illness. It feels like I haven't slept, ran a marathon, and have 48,000 more assignments to complete before tomorrow. The feeling doesn't pass easily. It doesn't lead me to some moment of clarity where the world gets easier and I'm cured. It's a roller coaster and it always will be. But you do start to notice that things get a little easier. And that your mood becomes more even. Anxiety becomes just a smidge more manageable. It is a quicker recovery when I do have moments of panic.

What I can say is without committing to this complete openness, I wouldn't be able to sustain a healthy life. I would continue becoming sick. I would not live a normal life. I quite frankly would grow worse and worse unless I finally took a stand and said all in or all out.

I understand mental illness is diverse and its not easy. Every story is different. Some harder than others. Some of us don't cope well. It's not your fault that you have this burden to bear.

It is however on you to take responsibility for it and to do everything you can to overcome.

We are all born with (as I like to call them) extra features. They are the pieces that might not be the highlight reel of our stories, but they are nevertheless part of who we are.

You don't get a pass because you're suffering from something. We are all going through something.

I encourage you to figure out what concoction of medicine, therapy, activity, etc that works for you. It's your responsibility to get out there and figure out what your perfect cocktail is and mix it. Nobody ever promised an easy life. The good news is, if you're dealt a difficult card, you've got the opportunity to make it easier.

The choice is yours sequins! Are you going to make excuses or build the tools to succeed?