I would like to start this post by emphasizing that this is not a political post.  I am not here to discuss the specifics of the book or the political opinions of anyone mentioned within the book.  After all, I am a therapist and not a politician.  For those who do not know, I am an avid reader.  I enjoy a good book and often look for meaning within books that I think will be helpful to myself or my clients.  I found several important messages within this book and I will share them here.

DISCLAIMER: To be honest, I was gifted this book.  I had not heard about it before hand and had not looked into what it was about.  (If you know me, this would not come as a surprise as I am prone to not google or research things in advance.) Thus, I started the book without knowing what I was about to get myself into.

As a mental health professional, I appreciate the honesty with which this book was written.  It would have been easy for Mrs. Obama to obscure parts of herself or her history in order to “put her best foot forward”.  I respect that she took so much time to talk about areas with which she struggled from fertility to problems within her marriage. I wish that more people could be so honest and upfront about their struggles.  Often when I see clients, they believe that their problems are so obscure that no one could possibly understand or relate to what they are experiencing. The truth is that there are many people who are struggling in silence with some of the same things with which you are struggling.

 

“For me, becoming isn’t about arriving somewhere or achieving a certain aim.  I see it instead as forward motion, a means of evolving, a way to reach continuously toward a better self.  The journey does not end…” – Michelle Obama

 

One of the most striking parts of the book that really resonated with me is the desire and driving force to achieve a specific goal.  Often, we are so committed to a specific goal and we believe that we will finally be happy once that goal is achieved.  Unfortunately, more often than not, achieving that goal did not bring the happiness we thought it would.  It often brings up regrets of things that we wished we would have learned along the way.

When we are children, we are often taught that life is a path with a map.  If we stray off of the path, we will be lost forever and never reach the final destination.  In the work I do with clients, I work to break down this misconception.  Life is not a map to a predetermined destination. It is a journey, an adventure.  Going off the path will not lead to your demise, it will teach you important lessons that you may never have learned otherwise. Even the worst of scenarios can be a learning moment if for no other reason that it teaches you that you are stronger than you think.

In the blog post last week, we discussed setting the foundation for change and how it begins with being understanding and forgiving of yourself.  There were several points within this book where this process is depicted. I won’t give detailed descriptions of these moments as not to spoil the book for those who have not read it.  I will say notice her honesty when she recognizes that her way of being is not the only way of being.  Notice that it took her time, but she understood that she had to make adjustments to not only herself but also her expectations of others. Notice how she used the different perspectives of others as a learning experience and not just as a challenge to her belief system.  Notice her acceptance of who she is was just as important as her acceptance of others.

 

“It’s all a process, steps along a path.  Becoming requires equal parts patience and rigor.  Becoming is never giving up on the idea that there’s more growing to be done.” – Michelle Obama

 

Everyone has a different path and a different journey that they are on, but that does not mean you are alone. I recommend this book as a rare opportunity to gain insight into what personal growth and development can look like from inside someone else’s head.  Rarely are we given the opportunity to see the steps and path someone took towards overcoming their personal struggles and external adversity.

Lastly, even Michelle and Barack Obama got therapy when they needed help in their marriage.  Don’t be afraid to reach out if you are struggling. If it can help them, it can help you too!

Happy New Year! Welcome to 2019!  Through our Instagram page, we shared two of our new year’s resolutions with you:

1) Make myself a higher priority.

2) Forgive myself for my past.

In this blog post we’re going to focus more on forgiving yourself for past.

Often, we set new year’s resolution or  plan to make changes to our lives and they inevitably fail.  We will go into more depth about actual goal setting in a later blog post this month.   In this blog post, we want to focus on the foundation of the  goals we set.

Often, the goals we have set are unrealistic especially in comparison to our current behavior.  For example:

Person: “My resolution is to go to the gym five days a week and work out for one hour each time”.

Me: “How often are you going to the gym now?  How long do you currently work out?”

Person: “I do not go to the gym at all right now.”

This is not to say that you should not make a resolution of going to the gym; however, it is unrealistic that you would be able to go from zero hours of working out to five hours a week of working out.  A more realistic goal would be to try to workout 30 minutes a week and increase once you have mastered that goal.  However, this is not often what happens.  We often set unrealistic goals and then we beat ourselves up and call ourselves a failure for not being able to meet the unrealistic standard with which we began.

I often tell my clients that people have a tendency to treat ourselves horribly.  We tell ourselves mean things, punish ourselves, and expect ourselves to be perfect despite how horribly we treat ourselves.  In many ways, we treat ourselves in a way that we would never allow someone else to treat us.  Why?

I do not pretend to have all of the answers, but what I can say is that it is easy to be mean to ourselves. Usually, other people are not privy to our internal dialogue.  There is no one to referee our statements to ourselves.  I often ask people to think about their body as a separate person (a little odd put go with me here).

Imagine your body was a separate person with their own voice. What would your body say back to you?

Would your body tell you that your expectations are unrealistic?  Would it tell you that it wished you were nicer?  Would it want you to be more patient?  More understanding?

As it relates to our past, we often have a list of things that we “should have”, “could have”, and “would have” done differently.  We often beat ourselves up for mistakes that we have made in the past.  While there are often lessons to be learned from the past, we can also blame ourselves for things that we could never have known.  Just because hindsight is 20/20 does not mean that you could have seen all of the warning signs in real time.  It is easier to find the red flags when you know that there are red flags.  It is harder to know if something is a red flag in real time.

I often encourage clients to have a kind and realistic approach to themselves in the present and in the past. I think it is important to have both perspectives when examining yourself and your thoughts.  I feel it is one of the healthiest ways to address oneself and one’s past.  Here are the steps:

Forgive Yourself:  Understand that the past is the past.  You can learn from it, but you cannot change it.  Beating yourself up for things that you should/could/would have done differently will not help you move forward.  It is more likely to keep you stuck in a place of anger/resentment.  Imagine that you made the decision you made with the best information you had at the time.  It is possible that you would have made a different decision with different information, but that is irrelevant.  You made the decision.  You are wiser now.

Be Kind to Yourself:  Once you have come to a level of acceptance and forgiveness about the decisions you have made in the past.  Stop beating yourself up about it.  This does not mean that you absolve yourself of all responsibility for past actions, that is not what we are talking about.  This means that you recognize your actions, recognize your responsibility, and understand what to do about it going forward.  You can do this without beating yourself up and talking down to yourself.  Accept that it happened and all you can do is make adjustments in the future.

Be Realistic:This is often the most difficult step as it is difficult to determine what a realistic response/reaction would be especially when we have a tendency to set unrealistic expectations for ourselves.  I often tell clients to imagine a friend came to them with this exact same scenario.  What would you tell that person?  Does what you would tell that person match what you would tell yourself?  Often, we are able to give great advice to other people but struggle to take our own advice.  The gap can come from the unrealistic expectations we place upon ourselves.  We can understand realistic and rational limitations of other people; however, we struggle to recognize realistic and rational expectations of ourselves. This last step may be difficult but making the effort to “practice what you preach” can help you work on setting more realistic expectations for yourself.

What would it look like for you to forgive yourself for your past?

What would it look like for you to be kinder to yourself?

What would it look like for you to be more realistic about the standards and expectations you set for yourself?

To my readers:

For those of you who follow this blog on Facebook, you would have seen a post recently describing the shift which has occurred within the blog.  For those who are new to the blog or who follow the blog through other avenues, you may be a little confused.  I wanted to take some time before the New Year started to do a “relaunch”, of sorts. I wanted to take some time to describe who I am, my perspective, and how I got to where I am now.  Here goes…

When you go into private practice as a therapist, one of the first questions you have to ask yourself is “What should I name my private practice?”.  General internet searches will tell you to either go with your name or a theoretical perspective which guides you as a clinician.  I decided to go with a theoretical perspective.  I wanted something that emphasized my perspective that it is impossible to understand a person without understanding their environment.  Not just the environment in which they are currently, but also the environments and social interactions which have gotten them to this point.

As a social worker by training, I have always appreciated of the systems and “Person-In-Environment” that makes the social work perspective unique.  I believe that we are social beings as such those social aspects have an impact on us as a person.  However, I do not limit “Person-In-Environment” to the current environment.  I believe that past environments and past social interactions have developmental implications; that is, what happened in the past impacts the person we are today.  If we want to better understand the person we are today, it means we must understand how the past and current environments and social implications have impacted us within the past and how they are currently impacting us.

so•cial con•text/ noun/ the circumstances that form the development of a person; experiences, social interactions, perspectives; through which a person can be understood.

When I first started this blog, I was working as a school-based social worker providing emotionally and behaviorally based interventions to kindergarten through high school students. Thus, many of the interventions described originally were targeted toward that population.  As I have made the transition to private practice, I have decided to have my blog reflect my work with individuals, families, and couples. The intent of this blog is to provide practical information and interventions to help people along their own paths to become their best selves and live their best lives.

I originally thought about deleting older posts to reflect the current shift.  However, I thought that in keeping with my social context perspective it was important to keep these posts.  Both as a reflection of my own professional development, but also as valuable resources for people who have found the information to be helpful.

I have appreciated everyone who has taken the time to support me on this journey.  I look forward to providing you with great content in the future.  Feel free to comment on our Facebook, Instagram, or within the comment section of this blog if there are specific topics you would like to hear more about.

Sincerely,

Teralyn

We have been discussing healthy boundaries throughout the last few posts as an act of self-preservation in which you enforce boundaries to help protect yourself.  In our previous blog post about setting healthy boundaries with toxic people, we discussed communicating your boundaries assertively.  You may have noticed that we talk about assertive communication quite a bit and you would be right.  In this post we are going to discuss what assertive communication is, why it is important, and what it looks like.

What is assertive communication?

Assertive communication is a style of communication in which a person stands up for their own needs in a way that is also respectful to other people.  This telling someone what you want/need in a way that is not yelling/screaming, which would be aggressive communication, or in a way that prioritizes the other person’s needs, which would be passive communication.  The goal is to find the happy middle between bullying someone into giving you want you want and allowing other people to walk all over you.

Why is assertive communication important?

The purpose of all communication is to relay a message to another person. In doing so, we want to make sure we are sending messages as efficiently as possible.  In passive communication, you are sending a message that the other person’s needs/wants are of a higher priority than yours. Often in passive communication, the needs/wants of the person are not communicated to the other party at all. If the goal is for that person to recognize your needs/wants, you are not being effective in your communication.

In aggressive communication, you are sending a message that your needs/wants are more important than the other person.  Often in aggressive communication, the needs/wants of the other person are not considered at all.  While it may be more effective in sending the message of your wants/needs, it may not be effective in getting the desired results.  Imagine a person walks up to you and starts yelling and demanding something from you.  How likely are you to give that person what they want?  Maybe you comply in the beginning, but if it continued to happen would you continue to comply?

Most people are most likely to respond to the needs and wants of others if they feel that their needs and wants are also being taken into consideration and respected.  This is why assertive communication is so important. It allows you to make your needs and wants known, while also being open and receptive to the needs and wants of others. This increases the likeliness of finding a middle ground between parties which would lead to a compromise.  It’s a win-win strategy.

What does assertive communication look like?

Constructing an assertive statement can be difficult especially if it is not something that you have done before.  To set the groundwork for assertive communication, we suggest that you:

• Figure out what you would like to tell the other person in advance. Having an idea of what you plan to communicate helps you stay on track during the discussion by reminding yourself of why you started the discussion in the beginning.
• Express your feelings and thoughts calmly. As we mentioned before, the point is to demonstrate respect for yourself and the other person.  When we discuss our feelings and thoughts in an angry or aggressive way, people are more likely to respond in an angry/aggressive way because they will feel attacked.
• Be prepared to walk away. As we mentioned in our previous post, the goal of setting boundaries and assertive communication is to protect yourself.  Sometimes, that means saying “No” and walking away when you need to.

Now that we have laid the ground rules for assertive communication, we are going to tell you how we suggest you craft an assertive statement.  Our model for assertive statements consists of five components:

1) Describe the behavior.

You want to take the time and describe explicitly what was done that made you uncomfortable.  We suggest starting the statements with “When I see…” or “When ______ happened…”.  The goal is to avoid judgment or making assumptions.  If you want someone to change their behavior, you must first be able to describe what exactly it is that you want them to change.

2) Share your thoughts.

We won’t go into the dynamics between thoughts and feelings here (we will save that for another blog post); however, it is important to recognize and express the thoughts you had about the behavior.  We suggest starting this section with statements like “What I think is…” or “That reminded me of when…”.

3) Share your feelings.

It is important to avoid comments that are unclear, such as “I feel like”.  We suggest using actual emotion words such as “worried”, “frustrated”, “reassured”, or “confused”.  This statement might start with “I feel…” or “I felt…”.

4) Suggest an alternative.

Remember, the goal is usually to get the other person to change their behavior.  It is important to express to that person a preferred alternative.  It should be an option that is acceptable to you and also realistic for the other person. Statements could start with “What I would prefer would be…” or “I would rather…”.

5) Identify Consequences.

Part of setting boundaries is communicating those boundaries and what will happen if those boundaries are not respected.  The consequence can be positive or negative, but it needs to be something that you are 100% wiling to follow through.  We do not suggest that the consequence be an threat or an ultimatums as they are often damaging to relationships and contradictory to what you are trying to achieve in assertive communication.  Also, specify a time or deadline.  This sets the expectation and provides an enforcement date/time.

EXAMPLE:

¹“When I tried to discuss my concerns with you, you did not respond.   ² It makes me think that you did not value my opinion. ³I felt frustrated and angry.  ⁴I would rather you acknowledge that you heard me or let me know that it is not a good time to talk.  ⁵I am willing to hold my concerns until a more appropriate time.  If this behavior continues, I will stop discussing my concerns with you.”

As you can see from the example, assertive communication allows you the opportunity to clearly state what you disliked, what you thought and felt about it, what you would prefer, and what you are willing to do about it.  It states your position clearly and then places the ball in the court of the other person to decide if they will or will not respect your position.  Once again, you can only control yourself, you cannot control other people.

As you can also see, assertive communication may not roll of the tongue as easily as other forms of communication.  It is best done when you take the time to construct your statement in advance.  It also takes practice.  We often suggest using this same framework to construct positive statements to make you more comfortable implementing the pieces.

No matter how assertively you communicate yourself, you cannot make another person respect your boundaries.  However, you can walk away knowing you expressed yourself clearly, calmly, and respectfully.