September 2012 – Emily Downward

To Change or Not to Change

September 26, 2012emilydownward

I’ve always been fascinated by the interplay between change and resistance to change. Our lives, as humans, are constantly changing, and yet, we often resist this inevitability and try to cling to things, whether it’s relationships, jobs, our youth, children, pets, or even our favorite pair of jeans.

Our bodies are built for homeostasis – the state of maintaining or remaining the same. Our biological systems work to maintain our temperature, heart rate, blood pressure. We are geared for “stasis” – the same – and yet we are constantly evolving, physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually.

Sometimes we are forced to change by events and circumstances outside of ourselves. We get dumped, fired, reassigned, and lose people we love. Massive changes cause us to work through our emotions and re-evaluate our position.

And then there are the times when we initiate change. We decide to make a move, change the way we’ve been doing things, or start a new routine. Generally, there’s a lot that happens “behind the scenes” before the change becomes apparent to the outside. I work with a lot of clients who are contemplating change or who recognize that what they’ve been doing isn’t working for them anymore, so they are open to doing things differently. I help them explore their feelings and thoughts about what’s going on and invite them to create a dream of what they really want, and then a plan to achieve it.

To make a change takes courage. Willingness to try and willingness to take a risk. Facing the idea that you might not succeed on the first attempt. I see clients with amazing courage and resilience and applaud them as they make positive changes for themselves and start to realize they can create the life they want. And as they see the positive changes for themselves, they gain confidence and empowerment and more joy.

And then they get hit with the Change-Back Attacks. Martha Beck coined the phrase to describe how those closest to you – your friends, family, coworkers – react to your new changes. Generally, as I mentioned, we humans resist change, and when one person makes some big changes, it upsets the homeostasis of the group. Others who are perfectly happy with the way things have been may try to cajole, force, manipulate or chide you back into familiar behaviors.

The best way to handle Change-Back Attacks is with love and compassion. Listen and understand that they are coming from a place of resistance, and if possible, calmly state your intentions. You can love and accept them for how they are without agreeing with them. Continue to follow your truth, your passion, and your capacity for love increases.

Love, Birds & Happiness

September 18, 2012emilydownward

When you’re in love, everything seems special: the birds sing so sweetly, there is beauty all around you, and you can’t stop smiling. If only there was a way to bottle this feeling and pull it out on days when you don’t feel so good!

Maybe we can…

Scientists have discovered we have mirror neurons in our brain, which enable us to feel what another is feeling. This allows us to empathize with others, and it also comes into play when we are reading a great novel or watching a play or a movie and feel the emotions of the character within our own bodies. Have you ever identified with a character so much you laughed out loud? (I’ve done this before reading a great book by myself in a restaurant. Who cares if I got crazy looks? Laughter is good!) Or found yourself crying during a touching scene in a movie? (Steel Magnolias or Terms of Endearment are sure tear-jerkers for me.)

Mirror neurons make it possible to feel something even if you’re not experiencing it yourself.

Knowing that our brains control what we feel, we can leverage it in our favor: saturate our minds with treasured memories and flood our brains with the feel good emotions and chemicals.

Martha Beck describes the technique of Sense-Drenching in her latest book, Finding Your Way in a Wild New World, as one of the techniques to get to Wordlessness, a state of being where you shift your consciousness out of the verbal processing and into the more creative, intuitive and sensory brain regions. To try it, you simply come up specific sensory experiences or memories for each of the five senses. Start with your favorite tastes, imagining experiencing them in detail. Add in memories of your favorite scents, unrelated to the taste memory. Next, add in tactile sensations, like touching a kitten or holding a newborn. Then, call to mind the memory of sounds you love, like birds singing, wind chimes or the ocean. Finally, remember your favorite sights: a scenic overlook, a beautiful painting, or a loved one’s face. Try holding all these sense memories in your mind at the same time – this shifts your brain from thinking verbally to the peaceful state of Wordlessness.

In the field of Positive Psychology, researchers have determined to maintain a more positive outlook, you need to have 3 positive experiences for every 1 negative one, and interestingly, they found that the frequency is more important that the severity. You can leverage this, especially on tough days, by increasing the positive experiences in your day. Listen to your favorite music, take a favored snack with you to work, or wear your favorite color. Gratitude helps me, too, by keeping my focus on what I have rather than what I don’t have or don’t want.

Wishing you all a little extra happiness this week!

Getting Comfortable with Being Uncomfortable

September 12, 2012emilydownward

As I write this week’s blog post, I’m sitting in an airport. I’m freezing, and I’m so cold I’m actually considering putting on all the clothes in my suitcase. I’ve had a job assignment the past couple days that has kept me on my feet for hours at a time. While I wore comfortable shoes, the long amounts of standing triggered the scoliosis in my back, and my lower back and right hip are painful. Sometimes I can ignore it, but the pain is at the point at which it will not be ignored any longer. The scoliosis (curvature of the spine) usually acts up during PMS each month, and oh, yeah, I might be experiencing that fun, too.* I’m tired – having spent a couple nights in a noisy hotel, just down the street from a busy firehouse and across the street from an active, early-starting construction crew – and being sleep deprived never helps anything.

All of this “background” helps explain (at least to me) why I’m having such difficulty writing a decent blog post this week. Usually, writing for the blog comes easy to me, and I find it enjoyable. But today, I’ve gone through three different topics, none of which turned into anything worth sharing, and the last one, which I thought maybe was good enough, disappeared when I unexpectedly and inexplicably lost my Internet connection. (F*&K! Saving ridiculously often now.)

So I realized all of this Uncomfortableness is actually a pretty decent topic. My mentor, Martha Beck, talks about the Cycle of Change in her book Finding Your Own North Star. In it, she describes four squares we go through during any major change in our life. Square 1 is known as “Death and Rebirth,” and this is the stage at which we feel the most confusion (“I don’t know what the hell is going on”) as the way we had defined ourselves has changed, and we haven’t yet figured out who we are without the old role or title. Square 2, “Dreaming & Scheming,” is when we begin to create concepts of a new future, and Square 3, “the Hero’s Saga,” is where we test out those schemes and figure out what really works for us. Square 4 is “the Promised Land,” where things smooth out, but the mantra is “Everything’s changing, and that’s okay” because everything always does change. I love sharing the Cycle of Change with my clients because it provides people with a sense of understanding and community (“Oh, so that’s what’s happening to me! And everyone feels this at some point”) and also a sense of hope (Square 2 and 4 are the most-looked-forward to).

Martha’s been saying lately that with the rapid pace of change in our world, we are pretty much in Square 1 nearly all the time. (So much for my hope idea.) So to survive, to not drive ourselves insane, we have to get more comfortable with being a little uncomfortable. We have to learn to roll with the punches, surf the chaotic waters, and maintain our equilibrium.

How do we do this? By going within. Peace cannot be found outside of ourselves; it must be found within. And when there is peace within, then we can take that peace out into the world.

As I play out the role of airport hobo today and stop fighting the Uncomfortableness, I let myself sink into feeling grumpy, tired and in pain, and I actually find a little relief. I don’t have to be anything more than what I am in this moment, and there’s some peace in that. Struggling against it all, wishing it wasn’t happening or thinking it should be better just prolongs the suffering. Accepting the present moment, just as it is, not trying to MAKE it be better than it is, actually feels better.

Or maybe the ibuprofen I took is finally kicking in. Peace out!

* If you want (or need) a really funny (and accurate) Life Coach’s Guide to PMS, go visit Bridgette Boudreau’s site. Hilarious and some great advice for getting through it!

Stop the Internal Violence

September 4, 2012emilydownward

“Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence but also internal violence of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man, but you refuse to hate him.”

~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

The people who come to me for coaching aren’t struggling with self-control over whether to shoot someone or not. (Whew!) But this quote by MLK made me think of violence or nonviolence towards the self. Many of my clients would never act violently towards others, and yet the thoughts in their heads about themselves are atrocious.

What does your inner dialogue say to you about you? Is it mostly encouraging, focusing on your unique strengths and talents? Or does it constantly keep a record of your mistakes, noting all the things you don’t do well, comparing you to others in a poor light?

I’m always so impressed by those who have a mostly positive inner dialogue. As for me, I wasn’t wired that way. My inner dialogue was mostly negative, perfectionistic (an impossible goal that keeps one frustrated and dejected), and critical. And while I’ve made great progress at strengthening and listening to my positive inner voice, the negative voice is still there. It’s like the weakened Voldemort in the Harry Potter series. It doesn’t have as much power as it once did, but you know it could still be dangerous.

In the field of positive psychology, researchers have created a formula for happiness:

Happiness = Set Point + Circumstances + Voluntary Variables

Your Happiness level (a subjective measure) is about 50% due to your Set Point, or your genetic predisposition on how you view the world. Another 8-12% is the Circumstances or conditions you were born into: your socioeconomic status, your gender, the family you are born into. That leaves 38-42% of your happiness up to Voluntary Variables, the ways in which you intentionally intervene on yourself, your choices and actions. (That’s where the magic can happen!)

Isn’t it interesting that Circumstances are only 8-12%? We often hear the differences between the Haves and the Have-Not’s emphasized, the privileges or lack of opportunities between groups or countries being touted as determining factors of success or failure. But researchers have shown that the Circumstances are not NEARLY as important as how we think about things, how we look at the situation. It’s not what you have or not, it’s the story you’re telling yourself about it.

When I went through coach training, in addition to learning amazing tools to help others live their best lives, it was an intensive experience to rewire my own brain, creating new ways of thinking that serve me, rather than crippling me. It is my great joy to be able to help others now with what I’ve learned and help them find more peace, joy and success.

So what is your inner dialogue telling you? Is it working for you, or against you?