Cognitive Defusion: How Thanking Your Mind for Its Worst Thoughts Can Help You Get Some Distance

By Annabelle Mebane, MA, AMFT

In Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, the overall goal of our work is to help clients increase what we call psychological flexibility, which is basically the ability to do what matters most to you in your life no matter what uncomfortable thoughts and feelings show up.

One of the skills we teach to help people respond more effectively to their thoughts is called “Cognitive Defusion.”

Our default mode is to take our thoughts at face value and to believe that they are true and important. Like a fish doesn’t know it’s in water, we don’t typically notice that we are thinking. We are so accustomed to looking out the lens of our own thoughts that we forget to recognize we’re wearing glasses at all, and that there might be more than one way to see things.

Cognitive defusion is the ability to notice that we are having a thought –

that our mind is “languaging” about our experience. Defusion involves creating a little bit of space that allows us to recognize that just because our mind thought it, doesn’t necessarily make it true or important. Why should we make that space? Because if we can recognize a thought for what it is – words our mind is generating – we can make a choice about how we want to respond to it. Instead of automatically buying into our thoughts or viewing them as directives or imperatives, we can tune in to our values – who and how we most hope to be in a given moment – and decide whether listening to a particular thought and behaving accordingly is going to move us toward or away from our valued direction.

There are a whole bunch of exercises

that we use in ACT to help you learn how to defuse from your thoughts. One of them goes like this. First, you state the thought exactly as your mind has it. For example, “if I go out on this date, I’m going to embarrass myself.” Then you pause, and notice what it’s like to sit with the thought. Next, you preface the thought with “I’m having the thought that…[thought]”, and notice what it’s like to sit with that. Finally, you preface it with “I’m noticing that I’m having the thought that….”, and tune in to what that’s like.

And then you can decide, do you want to listen to that thought, and stay home and avoid the possibility of being embarrassed because it feels more comfortable? Or are you someone who wants to be open, vulnerable, and show up anyways because it’s meaningful to you to try to find a fulfilling connection, even if it’s a risk?

Notice that when we are ‘defusing,’ we aren’t getting caught by the content of the thought, trying to prove or disprove it.

We are simply creating enough distance to allow us to choose how we want to respond.

But here’s the thing, sometimes it feels pretty hard to get that distance and to make a choice based on values.

Why? Because sometimes, or maybe even usually, the stickiest and most painful thoughts our minds have are designed to try to protect us from something painful. And probably, it kind of works. If we continue with the above example, your mind might be trying to protect you from the pain of rejection or disconnection. And yeah, if you stay home, you get the relief of know you can’t embarrass yourself and you can’t get rejected. But the thing is, if you avoid going out on any dates because you might get rejected or feel embarrassed, you are almost certainly also going to miss out on the possibility of a really meaningful connection.

The thing about pain is that it doesn’t show up around stuff that doesn’t matter to us; it shows up around the things that we care most deeply about.

On the flip side of our pain, we can usually find our most cherished values.

Your mind comes up with these painful stories to try to prevent you from feeling pain or loss around the things that matter to you, but a lot of times, when we listen to those stories, that’s what keeps us from accessing the richness of moving toward what really matters.

So for those especially sticky thoughts that seem so powerful and that are really deeply painful, sometimes the best defusion tactic is pretty counterintuitive.

Instead of beating yourself up for having such self-critical thoughts, you can actually thank your mind. You can thank it for trying to help you and for trying to protect you, and then you can let it know that you are going to take it from here.

It sounds nuts to thank your mind for telling you that you are weird or a failure or incompetent or unworthy or too sensitive, but when we meet our pain with compassion, understanding that our minds are just trying their best to do their job and keep us safe, we sometimes can start to take away the power of that really painful story and get just enough space from it to decide to respond based on something other than the avoidance of pain.

IF YOU FIND YOURSELF STRUGGLING, FEELING STUCK, AND/OR COULD USE SOME HELP NAVIGATING YOUR FEELINGS, YOU COULD BENEFIT FROM COGNITIVE BEHAVIORAL THERAPY, ACCEPTANCE AND COMMITMENT THERAPY, MINDFULNESS, AND TELEMENTAL HEALTH SERVICES. SAN DIEGO PSYCHOTHERAPY CAN HELP. WE CAN BE CONTACTED AT 619-269-2377.

A Lesson on Living Life to Its Fullest

by Shoshana Shea, Ph.D.

“You must defeat your reason before you can start” – Patrick Star

If you want to live life to the fullest, it’s not about forgetting all your troubles and checking out, it’s about slowing down, checking in, and recognizing you have choices. One of the greatest examples of this came from the imagination of Stephen Hillenburg, “SpongeBob Squarepants” show creator, and his writers. The character is Larry the Lobster; the name of the episode, “A Life in a Day.” As I watched that episode for the 100th time, I was thinking more about Larry’s secret to living life to the fullest; he pronounces, “You got to take risks. Live on the edge…by living each day like it was your last.” Larry goes on to say, “By livin’ like, me, Larry!” 

Living life to the fullest does NOT mean that we should try to ignore all our fears and worries.

Patrick The Starfish, states, “This is the moment where we redeem our miserable lives,” and decides that he must live moment to moment and find the most dangerous of feats; then he will truly be living! To Patrick, ‘Living life to the fullest’ seems to mean that we should try to forget reality and just live without regard for the long-term consequences. I think many of us can relate to that idea, that we wish to live completely free of fear and shut off our worries like a faucet. If only it were that easy! Patrick pronounces, “You must defeat your reason before you can start.” This is my absolute favorite line! It can sound so appealing to ignore that voice in our head that urges us to be cautious and go the opposite direction. But as appealing as it might sound to have no fear, as Patrick discovers, this can have pretty big consequences.

Cautious isn’t necessarily the same as stagnant or boring…

While Patrick is out thrill-seeking within inches of his life, Spongebob interprets living a full life to mean not taking any risks at all. He embodies that voice in our head that tells us to stay firmly planted inside our comfort zone. That familiar voice which can paralyze us, and which can make life stagnant, boring, and small.

Moving towards our values is not easy; otherwise we’d all be doing it!

When we are heading in a direction that is deeply meaningful to us (TOWARDS our values), we have to remember that the short-term is usually not easy at all. When we are moving AWAY from our valued direction, the short-term is usually a relief and can be enthralling at first. What we later find out is, ultimately, an AWAY move reveals that the hard stuff is still there and there are usually negative consequences to whatever method of avoidance we chose in the first place: Drinking excessively, overeating, acting impulsively, reckless thrill seeking (like Patrick), or staying well within our comfort zone (like Spongebob), etc. 

Mindfulness is a useful tool to help us move towards are values.

Mindfulness is often misunderstood to mean that we are only “allowed” to be in the present moment, and not think too much, or to not think at all, about the future. Being mindful is about non-judgmentally NOTICING and having awareness of what we are thinking, feeling, and experiencing, while we are in the present moment. For example, if we are aware that we are feeling sad about our work situation, we can notice the physiological sensations that arise, any other emotions that might be present, and any thoughts that emerge. We can make deliberate decisions about the direction of our life based on these observations. Mindfulness helps us stay the course. It can help bring us back if we have strayed or feel stuck. Contrary to Patrick’s version of “living in the moment,” it’s not about making quick, impulsive, reckless decisions and remaining cut off from our thoughts and emotions. After all, our thoughts and feelings can have really important information for us. Opposite of Patrick: Slow down.

Once we recognize thoughts that help us to move towards what’s meaningful, we have choices about our actions.

A mindfulness tool we use in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), is to look at whether our thoughts and actions are serving the function of moving us TOWARDS our values or are they moving us AWAY from what’s most meaningful. Often life throws up some curve balls. We can decide how we are going to relate to those barriers and take action. For example, using the example from above, if we notice we are unhappy at work, we might start researching other job opportunities, setting up informational interviews, and continuing to show up to work every day (all examples of TOWARDS moves), rather than quitting the next day (an example of an AWAY move), and putting ourselves in a bad position.

What will you decide?

At the end of the episode, Patrick has convinced Spongebob that really living is about engaging in a series of dangerous acts. As they are heading towards their demise, Larry saves them, but only after they are all severely injured. Larry chides them as they are heading towards the sharp rocks, “Look guys, my advice wasn’t meant to be taken literally, I meant to live life to the fullest; not to maim yourselves!” So what will you decide? To live like Patrick and “defeat your reason before you can start;” to live like Spongebob, and not take any chances or go outside your comfort zone; or to live like Larry…where risk is absolutely encouraged but in a calculated deliberate manner?

IF YOU FIND YOURSELF STRUGGLING, FEELING STUCK, AND/OR COULD USE SOME HELP NAVIGATING YOUR FEELINGS, YOU COULD BENEFIT FROM COGNITIVE BEHAVIORAL THERAPY, ACCEPTANCE AND COMMITMENT THERAPY, MINDFULNESS, AND TELEMENTAL HEALTH SERVICES. SAN DIEGO PSYCHOTHERAPY CAN HELP. WE CAN BE CONTACTED AT 619-269-2377.

Five Tips to Tackle Perfectionism and Engage with What Really Matters

By Annabelle Parr

Perfection. On the surface, perfection sounds, well…perfect. A worthy aspiration. Perfection is to be without flaw, and reducing flaws sounds like a pretty solid goal. Right? For those of us who have dealt with perfectionism, we know firsthand that it’s not all it’s cracked up to be. Far from making us our best selves, perfectionism can trap us in feelings of shame, guilt, low-self esteem, anxiety, and never ending stories in our minds about how and why we are not good enough. It can cause us to limit our choices and keep our lives small in order to avoid risking failure, and thus the tumult of pain that would follow. Far from making life feel perfect, perfectionism can leave us feeling empty and lonely. 

Filtering Out Flaws and The Trap of Social Comparison

In the age of social media, it is more tempting than ever to look at the perfectly filtered moments of other peoples’ lives and to feel like your life is the only one that is anything less than picture perfect (even during a pandemic!). When you compare your lowest moments to everyone else’s shiniest ones, your biggest flops to everyone else’s top ten hits, your worst failures to everyone else’s greatest achievements, your #nofilter to everyone else at their most coiffed, you are bound to feel like there is something wrong with you.

Social media facilitates an instant internal comparison of you at your very worst to others at their absolute best. When we buy into the idea that life should always look and feel Instagramable, we are setting ourselves us for disappointment. But perfectionism has been around far longer than Facebook, so let’s look at it more closely. Why is it so tempting to compare ourselves to others and pursue perfection as if it were possible?

Perfection = Happiness ?

It’s easy to equate striving for perfection with striving for happiness, something our culture loves to sell to us as the ultimate goal. At every turn, we are told that it is our job to be happy. Quite literally. If you are not a perpetually happy employee, partner, parent, friend, etc. you *must* be doing something wrong. Somewhere along the line, you must have messed up. 

But here’s the rub: happiness is an emotion, and like any other emotion, it is fleeting. No matter how apparently perfect your life is, you will still experience the full range of human emotion, including frustration, anger, anxiety, fear, sadness, grief, joy, excitement, and awe. There is no perfecting our way out of our emotions.

In fact, the more that we believe we must be perfect, the more likely we are to feel that we are failing and the more likely we are to be caught in uncomfortable emotions about how we don’t measure up to our own impossibly high standards. We are less likely to recognize our successes because *spoiler alert* they have not launched us into the untouchable perfect zone. Far from making us perpetually happy, a desire to be perfect is a surefire way to create extra unpleasant feelings.

Perfection = Growth ?

It’s also easy to confuse striving for perfection with striving for growth or improvement. And sure, if you are constantly beating yourself up about all the things that are wrong with you and all the ways that you are screwing up, you and your growing edges might be quite familiar. OR…

Maybe you are so petrified of being imperfect that you can’t actually examine where you have room for growth. You know you’re not perfect, but you have no concrete sense of how you want to grow because it is too excruciating to reflect on where you feel you are not measuring up. 

Scenario number two: you are busting your butt hard every day. You are exhausted and burnt out, yet no matter how much you check off your how-to-be-perfect-to-do-list, somehow the list just keeps growing. No achievement or improvement seems to make a dent towards the elusive end game of perfection.

Scenario number three: you are so paralyzed with fear of imperfection that you can’t make any choices at all. Terrified to make the wrong decision, risk making a mistake or even worse, failing, you choose not to choose. Far from perfect, life feels stagnant.

So if trying to be perfect doesn’t make us happy and doesn’t guarantee us growth, what’s the point?

Before you start beating yourself up for your perfectionistic tendencies, consider why you are so determined to be perfect in the first place. Even if it is a thwarted, misguided attempt, it probably makes some sense or else perfectionism wouldn’t be such a prevalent strategy.

Maybe your desire for perfection is a desire for belonging: somewhere along the way, you developed the belief that in order to be loved and to connect with others, you had to be flawless. Or maybe it is a desire to have a life that is rich with joy: you want a life filled with that which fills up your soul. Or maybe you find it fulfilling to strive to be the best version of yourself that you can possibly be. You have been striving to be perfect because you are trying the best way you know how to fulfill a deep need or desire. In other words, even though the strategy you are using has some pretty big costs, it makes sense.

What are the costs of perfectionism?

In order to redirect our energy toward a more workable strategy for engaging in life, first let’s consider the costs of trying to be perfect. They might include, but are certainly not limited to: missing out on the joy of life’s sweet moments and triumphs; saying no to opportunities for fear of failure; low self-esteem; inauthenticity leading to disconnection in the service of appearing perfect; burnout from taking on too much all the time; perpetual anxiety and shame; stagnation; and/or decreased sense of well-being. We become limited by an unattainable standard and life gets smaller and more restricted as we try to squeeze it into the perfect little box we have constructed in our minds about how it should be.

So what is the alternative?

From an Acceptance and Commitment Therapy perspective, perfectionism is at its core psychological inflexibility. The alternative, then, is to cultivate psychological flexibility. How? 

1. You are not your thoughts.

First, we defuse ourselves from our “not good enough” stories. Every time our mind generates a thought about how we are failing or how we might fail or how we have failed and are now somehow unworthy, we remind ourselves that this is our mind trying to protect us and also that this thought is just a thought. We – at our very core – are more than the contents of our minds in any given moment. Our thoughts are not the whole truth about who we are or about the reality of a situation.

In her new book, Be Mighty: A Woman’s Guide to Liberation from Anxiety, Worry & Stress Using Mindfulness and Acceptance, Dr. Jill Stoddard suggests we give our inner critic a name in order to defuse – get some space from – the judgements it generates. Then, when the Critic pipes up with some new version of the “not good enough” story, we can relate to them as if they were a well-meaning friend. We can thank them for their input and desire to help protect us or motivate us, and then we can connect with what matters in this moment.

2. Pause for presence.

How do we connect with what matters in this moment when we are caught in painful emotions? We get present to what is. As Dr. Shea says, take a breath and tune in to this “painful present moment.” Identify the emotions you are experiencing and get curious about the unmet need or desire underlying your feelings.

3. Let your values guide your choices.

If we look back to the needs or desires beneath our efforts to be perfect, we can start to get a sense for our values. For example, bring to mind an area of your life in which it feels particularly important to be perfect. Now consider what this says about what is important to you. What domains of your life feel most important? If you were your ideal self in each of those contexts, who and how would you be?

For example, if it is important to you to be a perfect parent, that probably means that you value your relationship with your kids. Or if it feels important to be the perfect employee or student, that probably means that your work is important to you. Now what qualities do you want to bring to these areas of your life? Our values aren’t goals that we meet, but they describe the way that we want to be in the world. For example, maybe you want to be a loving, compassionate, present, engaged parent. Or maybe you want to be a hard-working, conscientious, ambitious employee or student.

Here is the wonderful part about connecting with our values: we get to choose on a moment by moment basis what it looks like to act in a way that is consistent with who we want to be. And here is the beautiful thing – there is no end goal. You never achieve your values permanently. They are qualities of being you can bring to any moment. And when you fail to act consistently with your values in one moment (because you will), what matters is what you choose to do in the moment following.

4. If you want to live in line with your values, you have to be willing to have discomfort.

When we are caught in needing to be perfect, it tends to be excruciating to recognize when we fall short (often). This is partially because our desire for perfection shows up in the areas of life that matter to us. Making moment by moment choices in line with our values rather than in line with a goal of perfection does not spare us discomfort. Those areas of life still matter to us and it still will hurt when we fall short of acting in line with our values, even if we have defused from our desire to be perfect.

An important piece of the puzzle is that we must be willing to have uncomfortable feelings. We can’t take away the anxiety, sadness, anger, fear, or pain that are inevitable parts of being human. In fact, those feelings often point directly toward something that we care deeply about, and if we were able to rid ourselves of those emotions we would also have to get rid of the joy, love, happiness, and awe that come from connecting with what and who is important to us.

5. Finally, get present to what is.

One of the biggest costs of perfectionism is that we lose touch with the sweetness of life. We are so caught in wanting it to be perfect all the time, that we miss the bliss of both the big and small moments that come pretty darn close. When our minds are frantically searching for something wrong, we miss out on experiencing everything that might be so right. The point of being mindful and present is not to be happy all the time, but it is to bring nonjudgmental attention to what is in this moment. When we are truly present, we free ourselves up to make more deliberate decisions about how to act. We are more conscious of our thoughts and feelings, and we are more likely to catch the sweet little moments that brighten and enrich our lives.

“And now that you don’t have to be perfect, you can be good.” – John Steinbeck

John Steinbeck said it so well when he said, “and now that you don’t have to be perfect, you can be good.” The ACT perspective would say, and now that you don’t have to be perfect, you can live a life that is guided by what truly matters. You are free to connect with what is important to you and learn to live in line with who you want to be. When we need life to be perfect, we drain it of vitality. When we give ourselves the freedom to be imperfect, we free ourselves up to connect with who we want to be and what truly matters most.

IF YOU FIND YOURSELF STRUGGLING, FEELING STUCK, AND/OR COULD USE SOME HELP NAVIGATING YOUR FEELINGS, YOU COULD BENEFIT FROM COGNITIVE BEHAVIORAL THERAPY, ACCEPTANCE AND COMMITMENT THERAPY, MINDFULNESS, AND TELEMENTAL HEALTH SERVICES. DR. SHOSHANA SHEA CAN HELP. SHE CAN BE CONTACTED AT 619-269-2377.

How To Bring Meaning to Your Work Even When It’s Not Your Passion

Connect with your values and you can find meaning in any moment

by Annabelle Parr

“Choose a job you love, and you will never work a day in your life.”

Pretty good advice, right? Of course this expression doesn’t mean that you will literally never work a day in your life. Rather it implies that when you love your work, it feels like a choice more than a burden. On the whole, it adds value and meaning to your life, and fills your soul rather than saps it of vitality. To love one’s work is a beautiful thing that should absolutely be encouraged.

However, there are several important caveats to note when we discuss the importance of “loving your work.”

First of all, even if you love your job with all your heart, there will inevitably be hard days. Something about the saying above implies a sense of joy, ease, and effortlessness. Like if you love your job enough, you’ll hit some kind of work nirvana and just be blissed out all the time. But there will be days when – despite your love and passion for what you do – you are less than thrilled when your alarm goes off. There will likely be parts of your job that you love a bit less than others. There may be people you butt heads with. And there will be days that are downright crappy. No matter what your job or how much you love it, you will have hard days.

Work is work and it will still be challenging even when you love it.

When we set people up to expect that loving your work means you get to avoid difficult emotions and experiences, we do them a disservice. In fact, if you are looking for something perfect that involves 0% discomfort, it’s pretty much a guarantee that you will fail to notice something that you could or would love. No job is perfect; instead, look for the one that means enough to you that you are willing to suffer some discomfort for it because it is just that important to you. So, caveat number one: love does not imply perfection. However, it does imply purpose and meaning (more on that later).

Caveat number two: there is a certain amount of privilege inherent in prioritizing loving your job.

Loving your job is a wonderful goal, but not everyone is afforded the resources and opportunities necessary to attain their “dream job.” Figuring out what you love to do can take a lot of time, energy, and effort that many people do not have. Ultimately, work is a means to paying the bills – it is first and foremost about survival. When survival is on the line and basic needs are barely being met, loving your work is not high on the priority list because it often can’t be. So what about all those people who for one reason or another, are not able to put “love” as a top priority when it comes to their job?

Well, what does it actually mean to love your work?

I imagine that if you truly love your job, if you won the lottery tomorrow, you would choose to continue to work just for the love of the thing. So what if you don’t love your work? If you have the means to try to figure out what it is you do love and to seek that out, go for it! But if you don’t, you might still be able to find love in the midst of work even when the job is just a means to an end.

What if you don’t actually have to love the work that you do to find meaning in it?

What if the meaning isn’t necessarily in the job title or the day to day tasks, but actually in the way that you do it and the reasons you do it for? From an Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) perspective, life inevitably involves pain and discomfort. The problem isn’t pain, but rather the inflexible ways in which we choose to respond to it. We get stuck in our minds, in stories about how things are or how they should be; we get stuck trying to escape discomfort, but find only that our lives get progressively smaller and more rigid.

The antidote to suffering: psychological flexibility.

That is, being willing to have our experiences inside our skin (thoughts, emotions, sensations); choosing to be present in this moment; recognizing our thoughts for what they are: words generated by our minds rather than inherent truths about the way things are; choosing to see our selves as more complex than our current experience; and identifying what matters to us and deciding to act in the direction of what matters even when we are experiencing discomfort. In ACT, our personally chosen values serve as the compass for our actions in any given moment. And our values are qualities of being that we can bring to any experience at any time.

From an ACT perspective, love might have less to do with the work itself, and more to do with the qualities of being that you bring to it.

There is something about the idea of loving your work that seems somewhat fixed and rigid. Like you either love it or you don’t and that’s that. But when you choose to allow your values to inform your work, you have some sense of agency day to day regarding whether you will find meaning in this moment.

What are your personal values?

Maybe it’s important to you to provide for your family. Maybe it’s important to you to be kind and compassionate, or driven and tenacious, or present and engaged. These are all qualities of being that you can choose to bring to any job, on any given day. When we reconnect with our values – who and how we want to be – we can infuse our day with meaning no matter what we are doing.

Here’s a new saying for you: connect with your values and you can find meaning in any moment.

I think it’s meaning that we’re really after when we encourage people to do what they love. And it’s freeing to know that meaning is up to you. You do not have to find the elusive dream job before you can find meaning in your work. No matter the contextual restrictions on your ability to choose a job you “love,” you can still decide who you want to be when you show up every day to do your job, regardless of what it is.

IF YOU FIND YOURSELF STRUGGLING, FEELING STUCK, AND/OR COULD USE SOME HELP NAVIGATING YOUR FEELINGS, YOU COULD BENEFIT FROM COGNITIVE BEHAVIORAL THERAPY, ACCEPTANCE AND COMMITMENT THERAPY, AND MINDFULNESS. DR. SHOSHANA SHEA CAN HELP. SHE CAN BE CONTACTED AT 619-269-2377.

Work-Life Balance: On Connecting with Our Values

By Annabelle Parr 

As technology has expanded in the last couple of decades, the workplace has changed significantly. With laptops and smartphones, work can follow you outside of the office and into the hours outside of 9 to 5. While the upside of this shift is that there is now more opportunity for flexibility, the downside is that it can mean pressure to work non-stop. No place is sacred when the smartphone can ping you with an email anytime, anywhere. As a result of both the increased opportunity for flexibility and the increased opportunity for being forever on the clock, work life balance is tricky. How can we create balance between work and other important areas of our lives, like family, fitness, fun, etc.?

When work life balance becomes oppressive…

Though this question is certainly valuable and worth considering, the emphasis on work life balance also has the potential to become oppressive. Are you balanced enough? Have you created the perfect balance between working and spending time with your kids and your partner? Are you doing it all with a smile?

When we fuse with this ideal of work life balance – in other words, when we hold as a literal truth that we must equally balance our time between our work lives and the other aspects of our lives – we can lose sight of the original point behind the concept. We may find ourselves feeling increasingly stretched too thin. Rather than enjoying our so-called balanced lives, we may find ourselves feeling persistently inadequate, unsatisfied, and that we are failing in some regard.

Values-based living offers an alternative approach

So what can we do instead? We can construct our own personal definition of what it means to have a fulfilling, balanced life. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) suggests that when we connect with our own personally chosen, deeply held values (rather than values imposed upon us, designed to please culture/other people, or driven by a “should”), we construct a compass which guides our decisions. Values are not the same as goals or outcomes, but are qualities of being, toward which we can strive in each moment. When we are conscious of and connected to our values, we are equipped with a why to drive our actions. 

And once we know what matters to us, we can begin to prioritize the things that truly bring us meaning and fulfillment. We can gauge whether our lives are aligned with our values or out of sync, regardless of whether they live up to the ‘work life balance’ ideal. Then we can consider what (if anything) needs to change in order to better align with what’s really important to us. The beauty of this idea is that there is no one right way to structure our lives. To the extent that you have choices about your work and your time spent outside it, you get to decide what matters to you and what actions you can take in that direction.

How do we connect with our values?

There are a whole host of ways that we can get in touch with our values. ACT relies on experiential exercises and metaphors to teach psychological flexibility skills and to help us connect with what matters.

One exercise that can help you consider what is truly important to you is to try writing a summary of your own autobiography written twenty years from now. What’s the title? How do you hope to be described? What major accomplishments or milestones are noted? What stands out about you in your life story? 

If you’d like to try a similar exercise, imagine what you would want people to say about you in your eulogy. This exercise may sound morbid, but in connecting with the finitude of life, we can reflect on how we want to move forward with our lives and how we want to engage with the present, rather than reflecting back with regret. How do you hope you will be described by the people that matter to you most at the end of your life? How do you want to be remembered? What do you hope you will have accomplished? How do you hope to have spent your time? Who do you hope to be?

If this activity feels too morbid for you, before you decide not to complete it, be present with and honor the feelings that show up when you consider the exercise. Those feelings may have something important to say… 

Once you have done one (or both) of these activities, see what themes emerge. What matters to you? Who and how do you want to be? How do you want to spend your time? What do you want to bring to the world? You may notice some goals you have for your life, but see if you can step back from the goals and identify the qualities of being that you want to embody. These are your personal values. Now, consider how you can apply them to your life today. In what ways is your life consistent with or at odds with your eulogy or your autobiography? These are the areas in which you may want to consider making values-based changes.

IF YOU FIND YOURSELF STRUGGLING, FEELING STUCK, AND/OR COULD USE SOME HELP NAVIGATING YOUR FEELINGS, YOU COULD BENEFIT FROM COGNITIVE BEHAVIORAL THERAPY, ACCEPTANCE AND COMMITMENT THERAPY, AND MINDFULNESS. DR. SHOSHANA SHEA CAN HELP. SHE CAN BE CONTACTED AT 619-269-2377.

The Way We Use Mindfulness Matters

By Annabelle Parr

It seems like mindfulness is everywhere these days. In recent years, it has exploded on the scene as the seemingly catch-all cure for a whole host of problems, supposedly promising to address mental health concerns, decrease stress, improve performance at work, and make you a better parent. Its benefits are touted across the internet – from business sites like Forbes and Fast Company, to wellness sites like the Huffington Post, to inspirational sites like Upworthy.

It’s true that practicing mindfulness can benefit us in all sorts of ways, showing not only benefits to our mind and our mood, but to our overall physiological health as well. However, when something is subjected to as much hype as mindfulness has been, sometimes in all the air time, it can get watered down and potentially misrepresented. Depending on how we talk about mindfulness and how we choose to apply it to our struggles and our lives, mindfulness can be a huge help or it can become one more well-disguised attempt at avoiding and controlling discomfort.

So what actually is mindfulness?

Mindfulness has a long and rich history rooted in Eastern philosophy traditions, which have acknowledged its benefits for centuries. Jon Kabat-Zinn, professor of medicine at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, was a trail blazer in integrating an understanding of mindfulness into the Western conception of health. He defines mindfulness as “paying attention in a particular way: on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally.” Meditation is an example of a mindful exercise, but mindfulness can be practiced in any moment during any activity – one of the reasons it is so appealing and accessible as a means of promoting wellbeing.

Sounds ideal, right? You can practice it anytime, anywhere! The key to a stress free life is available to you in any moment! Well…not exactly.

 As Steven C. Hayes (2019) pointed out in his new book, A Liberated Mind, “it matters what mindfulness is for.” Why are we choosing to practice mindfulness? Based on any number of headlines and articles you read online, it sounds like practicing mindfulness is about getting rid of discomfort and stress. But thinking about it this way can actually make things worse! As Carl Jung noted, what we resist persists. The more we try to escape, avoid, or control our emotions, the stronger they tend to get. What’s more, when all our energy is devoted to controlling discomfort, our lives become increasingly restricted as our choices are dictated by what we are not willing to feel. When mindfulness becomes one more tool to escape or control uncomfortable experiences, it can end up fueling the same cycle that gets us caught in suffering.

So if it’s not about getting rid of stress, why should we bother being mindful?

From an Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) perspective, mindfulness helps make our lives richer and more meaningful. It does not guarantee freedom from discomfort. But it does offer us a new way to meet our pain. When we connect to the here and now rather than getting caught in regrets about the past or worries about the future, we are freed to notice what is happening in the moment and then choose to take action toward what is important to us.

The purpose is not to get rid of stress or anxiety or grief or whatever other uncomfortable feeling shows up, but rather to help facilitate awareness so that discomfort does not control our actions and define our lives. In being more present, we are free to notice not only the tough stuff like sadness or fear or frustration, but also the stuff that fills us up, like peace, joy and triumph. When we are not responsible for changing how we feel, we are freed up to change how we behave.

If you are interested in learning more about mindfulness, it can absolutely be helpful! And it can help you with things like stress and anxiety and work performance and being a more engaged parent and partner. But the reason it is helpful matters. A lot.

When you decide to show up to the moment mindfully, remind yourself that this is not a way to escape something difficult or painful. As psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor, Victor Frankl, so poignantly noted, “between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and freedom.” Mindfulness allows us to access that space. It allows us to hold our experience willingly and gently, allows us to notice helpful information that may be present in our experience, and allows us to make a conscious, active choice about how we want to behave. We are freed to choose to act in a way that is consistent with our values, and in so doing, we are invited to experience life as full of vitality and meaning, even when we are faced with discomfort.

IF YOU FIND YOURSELF STRUGGLING, FEELING STUCK, AND/OR COULD USE SOME HELP NAVIGATING YOUR FEELINGS, YOU COULD BENEFIT FROM COGNITIVE BEHAVIORAL THERAPY, ACCEPTANCE AND COMMITMENT THERAPY, AND MINDFULNESS. DR. SHOSHANA SHEA CAN HELP. SHE CAN BE CONTACTED AT 619-269-2377.

I Get Nervous in Social Situations…Do I Have Social Anxiety Disorder?

By Annabelle Parr

Most of us probably know what it’s like to feel nervous about public speaking or before going on a first date. We might feel anxious before a job interview, or find our palms get sweaty right before we shake hands with someone we’ve just met. But for the 7 percent of US adults that experience social anxiety disorder in a given year, the fear of humiliation and embarrassment can be debilitating (National Institute of Mental Health, 2017).

What is social anxiety disorder?

Getting anxious in a social situation does not mean that you have social anxiety disorder. In order to receive this diagnosis (American Psychiatric Association, 2013), you must experience persistent fear or anxiety about one or more social situations, causing you to either avoid or suffer through the feared situation. In addition, you must also fear that your behavior will reflect your anxiety and that this will lead to negative social repercussions, like humiliation or rejection. Finally, the anxiety must be out of proportion to what might be expected in that context. This fear, anxiety, or avoidance around social situations must last for at least 6 months and it must make it difficult to function in important areas of life, such as work, school, or relationships. 

What are some examples of situations that trigger social anxiety?

Individuals experiencing social anxiety might find themselves feeling anxious about any number of situations, including making small talk with coworkers, interacting with the cashier at the grocery store, ordering a latte, going on dates, attending parties, eating in public, giving a speech or presentation, or performing in front of an audience. The main fear underlying social anxiety is experiencing rejection or humiliation.

Social anxiety isn’t all bad.

Like all anxiety disorders, social anxiety disorder is an adaptive response gone awry. The reason we all know that heart pounding, cheeks flushing, palms sweating reaction to a nerve-wracking social situation is that we have evolved physiologically to avoid any trace of rejection. Humans are inherently social animals, and our survival has depended upon our ability to function in the context of relationships. Beyond basic survival, relationships also add joy and meaning to our lives. As a result, we are literally neurologically wired to connect with one another. We achieve that social connection by concerning ourselves with what those around us think, need, and feel. Imagine a world where everyone only cared about themselves and paid no attention to the impact they had on others…yikes! So a little anxiety around situations that might result in rejection can be a really healthy, adaptive response. However, if you find yourself so afraid of rejection that you can’t be vulnerable enough to engage in necessary or meaningful social interactions, that’s when social anxiety can become problematic.

Risking rejection is part of the process of having deeper connections.

The paradox here is that in order to seek connection, you are also automatically risking rejection. You cannot get the joy and reward of interacting and bonding with others if you are not also willing to accept that this will sometimes result in pain, embarrassment, or rejection. Social anxiety disorder – unlike manageable anxiety that shows up in any number of vulnerable situations – hinders connection because the desire to avoid rejection overwhelms the impulse to seek connection. In other words, you miss out on both the risks and the rewards.

What are the consequences of social anxiety disorder?

When social anxiety reaches disordered levels, it can make it impossible to focus on anything but anxiety, so you are unable to be truly present in the situation and you white-knuckle your way through. Or it is so overwhelming that you avoid the situation entirely, and life becomes restricted by fear. It can result in isolation, loneliness, and underperformance in areas which you might otherwise excel. The catch is that the anxiety is so strong that it prevents you from learning that a positive outcome is possible. In Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), this is called experiential avoidance.

Does social anxiety have to rule my life?

No! The good news is that social anxiety is highly treatable. With Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), clients can learn to reframe their anxious thoughts to be more realistic, as opposed to catastrophic. They can learn that anxiety is not all bad, but how we view it drastically affects how it impacts us. And with the help of a therapist, they can learn to slowly face the things that have come to feel impossible. ACT, the third wave of CBT, can also help clients to get in touch with their values and act in ways that bring meaning to their lives, even when they are experiencing something difficult, like anxiety or fear.

Getting anxious in social situations is a pretty universal experience. It’s hard to find someone who has never been nervous about some kind of vulnerable, human-to-human experience. But when it becomes something that is making it difficult to engage in life in the ways that bring you purpose and joy, it might be worth reaching out for some help.

IF YOU FIND YOURSELF STRUGGLING, FEELING STUCK, AND/OR COULD USE SOME HELP NAVIGATING YOUR FEELINGS, YOU COULD BENEFIT FROM COGNITIVE BEHAVIORAL THERAPY, ACCEPTANCE AND COMMITMENT THERAPY, AND MINDFULNESS. DR. SHOSHANA SHEA CAN HELP. SHE CAN BE CONTACTED AT 619-269-2377.

References

American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (5th ed.). Washington, DC: Author.

National Institute of Mental Health. (2017). Social anxiety disorder: Statistics [Webpage]. Retrieved from https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/social-anxiety-disorder.shtml 

How did I get stuck in this rabbit hole? Overcoming negative self-talk

by Shoshana Shea

Have you ever fallen down the rabbit hole of negative self-talk and found yourself thinking…

·      “I’m unworthy”

·      “I’m not good enough”

·      “I hate myself”

·      “There’s something wrong with me”

If you said yes to any of these, you are not alone. 

Where does this come from?

These negative thoughts emerge when we are in pain. We want to unfeel our feelings, but we can’t.  We want the pain to end. This is where the self-critic comes in and wants to make sense of our pain so it can stop. When it can’t find an easy fix, it starts saying things like “There must be something wrong with me.” “I hate myself for caring and my (perceived) shortcomings.” “I’m unworthy.” “I’m unlovable.” “I’m not enough.”

If we have enough hard painful events in our lives, which most of us do, we start to have narratives (aka storylines) about who we are and how things are going to go (not well!) in any situation; we stop checking scenarios out for what they are.  Sometimes we even deny that we have emotions at all. An example of this would be if you went out on a date, had a great time, felt like you connected with the other person, and then you never heard a word from your date again. You might think that you are unlovable, hate yourself, and decide that dating isn’t for you. This is not true. Yes, you are having a painful present moment, but your interpretation and the assumptions you make may not be true. In other words, thinking you are unlovable does not equate to actually being unlovable.

Cognitive Fusion: Believing our thoughts, acting on them, and getting stuck in the rabbit hole

In Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), this is called Cognitive Fusion, which means that we take our thoughts as absolute truths. When we experience cognitive fusion, we feel we have to carry out our thoughts’ directives without question, even if they tell us to make ourselves small or that we are small. When we are completely ‘fused’ i.e., attached, to our thoughts, we get pulled down the rabbit hole.

Cognitive De-Fusion: Unhitching from our thoughts

So if cognitive fusion means unquestioningly believing our thoughts to be absolute truths, cognitive de-fusion means that we are able to notice our thoughts without automatically acting on them. This is where mindfulness comes in. Viktor Frankl has been attributed to have said, “Between stimulus and the response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose a response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” When we can de-fuse, or get some space from our thoughts, we are able to see them and understand them better, even though we often might not really want to see the hard stuff in front of us.   

Here are some techniques to consider for getting distance from the self-critic:

1. Give yourself the benefit of the doubt that you are feeling the way you do for good reason. There is ALWAYS a reason why you are feeling the way you do, but it is not because you are worthy of hating yourself! Take the example up above. The reason you might be feeling you hate yourself is because there was a painful present moment that you couldn’t control. You actually have no idea why your date never called back. Perhaps they were already dating someone else. Perhaps they were not in a place to move forward in a serious way in a relationship. You can’t know for sure what the reason is, and your feelings of pain are valid, but they are not an indication that they exist because something is wrong with you.

2. Name the emotion. Once you have given yourself the benefit of the doubt that you are feeling something for good reason, ask yourself what those feelings might be. Emotions are usually one word: Sad, fearful, anxious, hurt, etc. Emotions give us important information.

3. “Am I worthy?” is not necessarily the most helpful question to ask yourself. Instead, ask yourself, “What is the Painful Present Moment?” (Which I call The PPM).  Continuing with the above example, you might be dating because you would like to find a life partner. In this scenario, the PPM is that since your date did not call back, you have not yet found your partner. That, in and of itself, does not feel good and could be quite disheartening. The self-critic may say, “It’s because you are not enough.” The mind is coming up with explanations because you are in pain and it is hard to sit with that. It’s hard to accept that you probably need to keep dating, when it clearly has not been a great experience thus far.

4. Anxiety and sadness are not bad in and of themselves. They are there for good reason (See point #1); it’s UNACKNOWLEDGED anxiety and/or sadness that leads to the problems. For example, walking home at night in a not so safe neighborhood, you have two choices: you have a well-lit street that takes longer, or a short-cut through a dark alley. Which one gives you anxiety? It serves a good purpose in our lives if we examine the cause of that anxiety. So the next time you are feeling anxious, give yourself the benefit of the doubt and try find out why.

5. Have Self-Compassion. If you can’t quite access why the negative self-talk is raining down on you so hard, try to have compassion for yourself. In other words, at least try to make the effort to understand yourself, even if you still feel like the emotions are just there for no apparent cause. Practice statements like, “I get why I’m feeling anxious because...” or “I’m probably feeling this way for good reason, even if I don’t know what that exact reason is right now.” My favorites are, “This stinks” and “No wonder I’m feeling this way.”

6. Practice saying, “My mind is having the thought that (insert self-critical statement)...” For example, “...that I’m overthinking this” or “…that I shouldn’t be taking this so hard.” This helps you to separate your mind from your self, and can help create some space that can allow you to recognize that your thoughts are not necessarily cold hard truths.

7. Try slowing the pace of your words, adjust your intonation, and use a kinder tone of voice. “(Oh no!) I'm anxious!” vs. “I AM anxious, and I don't have to pretend I'm not. It's actually my body telling me that something needs my attention.” This helps with cognitive flexibility and organically shifts your perspective. The function of the mind/self-critic is to alert you that something VALID needs your attention.

8. Talk to a trusted other. If my mind is working overtime to either spin and/or criticize me, I know that important truths are begging to be uncovered and unpacked beneath the storylines my mind is trying to tell. And if I can’t uncover it on my own, I ask a trusted other to help me to create space between myself and my thoughts so I can get that shift in perspective I so desperately need. You may think you have talked and thought about this enough already, so last thing you want to do is talk about it more. Consider this idea: yes, you have been thinking a lot, but you are likely stuck in the rabbit hole, especially if there is little to no relief and the end to your suffering is nowhere in sight. Talking to someone else can allow you to formulate more helpful questions so that you can move forward in a meaningful way.

If you find yourself struggling, feeling stuck, and/or could use some help navigating your feelings, you could benefit from Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, and Mindfulness. Dr. Shoshana Shea can help. She can be contacted at 619-269-2377.