Is Meditation for Everyone?

Shining a light on meditation, trauma and living with wisdom!

 Imagine you are living in a very dark room; life is generally ok, but you do have strange bruises on your shins from bumping into things and a terrible sneezing problem.

As a psychologist and meditation teacher, I sit at the very interesting intersection of science (and the world of evidence-based practices and techniques) and wisdom traditions (and the depth of understanding regarding what it means to be human).

 As the amount of scientific research into the efficacy of meditation as a tool to support our mental health increases, together with our understanding of what offering a trauma-informed meditation approach might look like, I have been deeply pondering the question “Is meditation for everyone?”

 If you had asked me this question 10 years ago, the answer would have been a straight out YES. Back then, I was a meditation and mindfulness evangelist. I would maneuver every possible conversation towards the topic – I am pretty sure people started avoiding me at parties for the fear of being told how they “should” be living! But, with the passing of time and the growing of wisdom (hopefully!), some profound life experiences of my own and some additional reading, training and teaching, I have learnt that the answer might not just be YES, it is more likely to be YES, “and”…..

 The “and” is rather nuanced and quite delicate with many layers to it. I will try, however, to explain the “and” as best I can for you.

 The truth is, research tells us that meditation IS good, it is helpful, but it may not be MORE helpful than other things we can do for our mental health and general wellbeing. It may not be wise for us to replace our other coping tools (such as exercise, good sleep, and high-quality relationships) with just meditation, but I contend that it may be very wise for most of us to add it to our tool kit. Especially now, in a world with so much pain and in need of so much healing. Our outer world reflects our inner world so let’s start there.

 Meditation, however, may not be appropriate for everyone, all the time. For those of us with a profound trauma history, meditation can be useless and, in some cases, damaging if not explored with caution and as part of a holistic approach to healing. However, we must be careful not to “throw the baby out with the bathwater” and continue to invest time and energy into both research and education when it comes to this powerful, profound, and age-old tradition. To explain this concept further, let me share a metaphor.

Imagine you are living in a very dark room; life is generally ok, but you do have strange bruises on your shins from bumping into things and a terrible sneezing problem.

 You are not exactly sure what is causing the bruising or the sneezing but, you have learnt to live with them and manage them as best you can. You use an ice pack on the bruises and take antihistamines when the sneezing gets unbearable but usually, you just try to avoid the areas of the room where you have noticed the bruises and sneezing get worse.  

 Then, one day, you invite a friend over. This friend asks if they can turn the light on - the room is so very dark, they say they feel you might be able to see more with some light. This friend has read a lot of books about turning lights on and in fact, has turned on many lights in the past. You are sure they would do a good job, but you still say, “no thanks, I like it this way” and so, for the time being the light stays off.

 The next time the friend visits however, they ask again whether you would be happy for them to turn the light on for you, and this time, as they ask in a way that is kind and understanding, without judgement and with great curiosity, you say “Oh, OK, let’s give it a go”.

  So, on flicks the light.

 For the very first time in your life, you see that the little room you have come to call home, is not only full of furniture that you didn’t know was there, but also completely covered in dust. Now, it is very likely the furniture is what you have been bumping into in the dark and the dust is partly the cause of your sneezing. You notice the corners where you become most sneezy are completely covered in a grey powder! But you also notice that your room is part of a much bigger building and even though at times you felt alone, you never really were. This is a big surprise!

 Now, you have many choices at this point, a couple might be:

1. You can say “thank you friend, but this whole living in the light thing is just not for me!” and simply carry on with your life the way it was, this is of course completely your choice.

2. You can become angry with your friend as they were the one who switched on the light and you were very happy thank you very much, just living your bruised and sneezy life. You keep avoiding the furniture and taking your antihistamines and promptly turn the light back off and ask your friend to leave and not come back.

3. You can thank your kind friend for showing you the true state of your room and then perhaps ask for their help to either move the furniture around a bit and clean it or get in professional cleaners. You understand this rearrangement of furniture and cleaning might take some time, but you are prepared to do the work and get in a roll up your sleeves. As the sorting out and cleaning goes on, you learn to navigate more effectively around the furniture in the room, you even remove some pieces that are way too small for you now that you are an adult! As the dust clears, you might be able to reduce your reliance on the antihistamines or, perhaps one day, stop them all together. The discovery that your room is one part of a much bigger building brings you great relief and support.

 In this metaphor, the room is our mind, the furniture our unconscious habits, the dust is our traumas, pain and neuroses, the corners are the really scary parts of ourselves, the friend is a meditation teacher, the light is meditation, the ice-packs and anti-histamines are our exit strategies (alcohol or addiction or medication or whatever we take or do to avoid seeing our habits, ourselves and our lives clearly), the professional cleaners are psychologists and other helping professionals (body workers, doctors, psychics etc.) we might work with to support and facilitate our healing. The big building we are part of represents the connection we can start to feel to the world around us once we meditate – a sense of belonging and a sense that we are never really alone.

The key message here is that meditation, per se, is unlikely to actually create the pain that can sometimes be revealed when we begin to practice. Once “the light is on”, we can start to see all the parts of ourselves that we may have been working so hard to avoid. We see the sad and lonely and anxious parts, but we also see the loving, joyful and grateful parts. The truth of emotional numbing is that it is not selective – when we avoid feeling the more challenging parts of being human, the more beautiful parts of being human get dialed down too. The further gift in all of this is that meditation might just introduce us to the possibility that we are an integral part of the whole tapestry of life and help us feel connected and supported – even in our most difficult times.

 So, is meditation for everyone? Well, the answer is Yes and there may be times it is not appropriate. Furthermore, our approach needs to be tailored to each individual and their unique needs, there is not a one size fits all approach to meditation.

 If you are looking at learning to meditate yourself, do it with a 1:1 teacher (or coach/therapist) or in a class where you can ask questions. Integrate it into your current plan for good mental health and wellbeing (good sleep/nutrition, exercise, and positive relationships) and make it a daily habit. My deep hope for you is that the light of your own awareness and love will guide you in your life and bring you many years of connection, joy and good health.

Meditation at work, at work

Meditation can offer so much opportunity for the growth and development of both individuals and teams in a workplace. However, it is important that any meditation initiative is offered with care. Here are some guidelines to consider when introducing meditation to the workplace:

Make it Optional – meditation has many proven benefits, one of them being the deepening of the relationship within ourselves. This relationship is sacred, and the individual should be invited to explore it, rather than be told they “have to” – especially within the workplace. It is suggested that meditation be offered rather than ordered and that employees be welcomed in a way that best suits them.

Make it part of the Routine – real change happens when we meditate in small doses regularly, rather than sporadically. The research tells us we are more likely to experience benefits with meditation with a short 5–10-minute daily practice, rather than a 60-minute practice on a Sunday. Is there a way you could offer a daily/weekly opportunity to meditate together in your workplace – perhaps before or after a regular meeting? Meditation can be done face to face or remotely and there are plenty of apps and resources leaders can draw on to help guide the sessions.

Pin it to a Broader Health and Wellbeing Goal or Strategy- people like to know why they are doing something, rather than just doing it. It can be helpful to communicate to the team why the leaders feel meditation might be a useful addition to the other wellbeing initiatives the organisation already offers.

Add some Science - some team members might like to see some of the robust research results that are making their way into some of the most respected medical and psychological journals (many of which are happening here in Australia via Melbourne and Monash Universities).

Have a Lead or a Champion – it is helpful to have a passionate meditator (or aspiring meditator) as an internal lead or champion to maintain momentum of the organisational meditation initiative when the shine and novelty inevitably wears off.

Work with a Qualified Teacher – few workplace leaders are also meditation teachers and good teaching is important when it comes to this work. In fact, the research tells us, that it is the skill and experience of the teacher that is the strongest predictor of the effectiveness of meditation both in schools and workplaces. As such, it may be worthwhile to engage a qualified teacher to run regular sessions with your team. The Meditation Association of Australia’s website is a great resource to help you to find a qualified teacher.

The simple fact is the science is in; meditation is good for us. Workplaces have the opportunity to both nourish individuals, enhance the strength of teams and impact the overall work culture by offering meditation as part of their wellbeing program.

Unconditional Love can be Hard

We can learn and access unconditional love in many ways - this is GREAT NEWS!

“You are loved when you brush your teeth,

You are loved when you won’t”

 To all of the parents out there, what does this paragraph from my new book YOU ARE LOVED bring up for you? Is there are part of you that cringes at the thought of giving love to a child who does not do what is expected of them? I totally get it; I have that part sometimes too.

The concept of unconditional love can be a tricky one to wrap our heads (and hearts) around, especially when a child is demonstrating behaviour we are not thrilled with.

Many years ago, we were holidaying with another family. One of the parents was telling me a story about how their eldest had recently drawn all over the walls in green marker and that they were exasperated when it came to keeping up with the energy of this busy child. I flippantly said “oh, so you love them a little bit less at the moment?” and with wise and kind eyes, this parent looked directly at me (possibly shocked!) and said “Well, no, I get angry, and I set boundaries around their behaviour, but I never withdraw love”. “Huh?” I thought, the idea that we can both love someone and be firm, or even angry with them was new to me.

Over my career in mental health and wellbeing, which spans over 20 years, together with the wisdom gained from my life as a living, breathing, feeling human (which spans 45+ years!), I know that connection to ourselves and others is the strongest predictor of good mental health. We are neurobiologically wired for it, it gives meaning and purpose to our lives (Brene Brown). Where there is disconnection, there is disease, where there is connection there is flourishing.

Unconditional love/connection from a parent/caregiver (or even teacher or coach) can be transformative, if it is available. However, it simply won’t be for some of us, just as it won’t be for some of children with whom we work if we are educators. So, we, and they, need to find other ways to access it. This is the great news!  We do not need to rely just on other people to give us this stable and secure ground of love and connection, we might discover that it is already within us, and it always has been. This sense of connection can be accessed in many ways, for me, meditation has been the most powerful, but there are other ways too.

 We do not need to rely just on other people to give us this stable and secure ground of love and connection, we might discover that it is already within us, and it always has been.

Think about when you feel most connected and at home or at peace. For some of us it might be when we are surrounded by nature, for some of us it might be when we are living in line with our values or when doing something creative where we can let our heart sing. For our children it might be when they are playing with a pet or snuggling their favourite toy. It doesn’t really matter what the source of this love is, what matters is knowing that it is always there to rest back into and that it does not need to be earned. Knowing we are loved no matter what is life-changing and can free us to live to our fullest potential.

This is not to say the concept of unconditional love is easy, it has not been modeled for many of us and so it is brand new. However, as parents, we can do a few things to work with this realisation.

-       Firstly, we can offer ourselves unconditional love and compassion (this could fall under the category of “re-parenting”, where we repair the inevitable damage from our own childhoods). We can remind ourselves that we too are still loved when we don’t brush our teeth or get the job or achieve some other goal. We are still worthy of love and belonging no matter what. Have you ever noticed when we feel badly towards ourselves, we tend to feel less connected or loved? I certainly have.

-       Secondly, we can explore which of our unmet needs or expectations are getting in the way of our capacity to love our children without strings. We may ask ourselves, am I wanting my child to be different from who/how they inherently are? Why is that? Is it something about making me look like a “good” parent?

-       Finally, we can support our kids to access the sense of unconditional love and connection for themselves in many ways, meditation being one. We might ask them how they feel when they are surrounded by nature or when they are absorbed in a creative endeavor. We might encourage them to pay attention to that sense of “fullness” in their body and to remember it so they can recall it when they need support to ride the stressors in everyday life. This is how we build resilience.

So, what will we do when, after reading YOU ARE LOVED with our child, the very next day they turn around and refuse to brush their teeth? Well, how would we deal with any other behaviour that creates risk for them? We might explain that while we understand they don’t want to brush their teeth, they need to for their own health and yes, we will still love them and then we will kindly, but firmly, set boundaries around this risky behaviour. We don’t want a generation of  “good” children who ignore their own wisdom, intuition and creativity to fit in.

My vision is a future world full of grown-ups who trust themselves and do not need to hustle for a sense of love and belonging by “fitting in” or being “good. To achieve this, we might be wise to be teaching our kids how to access the unconditional sense of love and belonging that is their birthright. We also want them to brush their teeth of course. I mean, we all want a future of fulfilled grown-ups – preferably with a full set of healthy teeth to go along with their realised potential!

Burning, Unlearning and Learning

All of us have learned and integrated many things of which we are completely unaware. Subtle messages or rules about who we are, how we should be and how the world works.

In psychology, we call these “schemas” and, by and large, schemas are incredibly helpful. They allow us to organise and interpret vast amounts of information very quickly which means we can respond most effectively to our environment. Imagine if every time we went into a restaurant, we needed to relearn the process of asking for a table, sitting down, ordering from a menu, eating and then paying the bill! If we had to work it out every time, the whole thing would be exhausting!

The same goes for much more complex and much more important happenings in our lives. Within each of us there is a set of rules, beliefs and expectations that we have either learned or inherited. It is these stories that run our lives and provide the filter or lens through which we see the world. Our world. As the wonderful quote by Anais Nin declares:

“We do not see the world as it is, we see it as we are”

Our world is changing, we are waking up. We, as a society are starting to peel back and peer through some of our shared stories which, for better or for worse, served their purpose in years gone by. We are becoming aware of many mindless assumptions we make, or schemas we use and, rightly so, many of us are calling out previously accepted exhibitions of racism, sexism, classism, ableism and other “isms” I am not yet versed in. But I am learning. I am unlearning and I am learning, both at the same time.

But I am learning. I am unlearning and I am learning, both at the same time.

We must be careful however not to get caught up in the act of peering through the stories so that we forget the purpose of our original quest, which is surely to create a more loving, healthier, and safer world. When we find ourselves judging others for their lack of “wokeness” we might be wise to check ourselves, and the pedestal we may have put ourselves on and then see that for what it really is, just another story. We might then kindly, and with great compassion and curiosity, take them by the heart and invite them to see another way.

I am starting to really see some of my own stories. I have been delving into my personal stories for some time, but now it is time to explore my societal stories. My expectations about how the world outside of me “should” be.

Recently I was talking with a colleague about a medical procedure she was having, and I innocently asked about the surgeon and said, “what is his recommendation?”. She looked at me with kind eyes and said, “she has recommended xyz”. I was ashamed and embarrassed that I had completely, mindlessly assumed her surgeon was a man. My learned schema of a surgeon is a middle-aged man and the more I explored this assumption, the more I learned about the complexity of the tangled web that had been woven for me (and at some point I chose to continue to weave myself) when it comes to the roles of men and women. But we can use embarrassment and shame to help us to grow. We can feel the burning hot discomfort of being blinded by our schemas and still be committed to lifting the veil to learn more.

We can feel the burning hot discomfort of being blinded by our schemas and still be committed to lifting the veil to learn more.

Unfortunately our human conditioning is to recoil from discomfort, and, for good reason, it has been imperative to the survival of our species. We feel something sharp on our skin, we reflexively pull away to save ourselves from being hurt.

Now is not the time however for us to recoil from emotional discomfort (usually the wave of shame or embarrassment - you know the one?) of realising we have been or even are racist, sexist, classist or ableist. We need to accept it, own it and then make an effort to grow and change. Mindfulness and meditation and all the skills they offer us are incredibly valuable assets on this journey of seeing life, and ourselves as it is and as we are. Once we are up close and personal with reality, and the Truth, that is when we can really make a difference. We can burn, unlearn and learn together and continue our quest in creating a more loving, healthier and safer world for all our inhabitants.

In Pursuit of Clear Water

How the “wellbeing industry” can over promise and under deliver, sometimes leaving us feeling worse

 Some modern gurus would have us believe that when we are born, we are like pure, clean, fresh water. Untainted, open, loving, peaceful. It is only our early experiences that colour our water.

 And so, we are told, we must work hard (through meditation or practicing gratitude or buying whatever miracle potion they are selling) to cleanse ourselves of the devilish colour the world has seeped onto and into us.

And, then after years of work, if we don’t get “better” or “enlightened” it is our fault, and we just “haven’t tried hard enough” or “worked hard enough” or “built enough insight”. And so, the cycle continues, and we pay more money and spend more time trying to fix ourselves, this time fueled by shame and fear. We are striving, and pushing and abandoning ourselves over and over and over again. The story we are sold is that if we just do as they say, we too can have all that they (appear to) have.

 After being one of these people myself and jamming meditation down the throat of whomever would listen to me, I now know, this approach is both cruel and downright wrong. We are not all the same and yes, meditation (and other personal development activities) is likely to be helpful to many of us, but we cannot be sure exactly what kind of effect it will have, and we certainly can’t promise any kind of ideal outcome or arrival destination.

 What if we are each born into this world with our very own colour, coded into our very cells? Of course, our colour changes as we encounter and learn certain things in our life. However, at the end of the day, we all bring our own unique colour to any kind of personal development work we do. So, if we are all starting from a different place, of course the results of any kind of development will also be different. Comparison is futile, we are simply not comparing apples with apples. In fact, we may not even be comparing fruit with fruit!

For example, if I was represented by the yellow glass of water and you the blue glass of water in the image above (the combination of my genetics and early experiences made me yellow and you blue) and we added the same amount of the same red dye (representing “the miracle cure”, say, 20 minutes a day of meditation) to our respective glasses, would we turn the same colour? Of course not! I would be orange and you would be purple. Both beautiful colours but very different, even though we added the same “dose” of the “miracle cure”.

So, when any teacher or guide or coach or guru tells you that if you do “x” you will categorically get “y” and that if you don’t get “y” it is your fault - run a mile! We each need to find our own recipe for thriving, considering all the causes and conditions that have come together to make us the unique and wonderful colour (well, colours – let’s be honest!) we are!

 When it comes to the possibility that we are all in fact clear water, as is the case with most things, there is a kernel of truth in this. We ALL do have pure, clear, clean, open water in us, in fact it is our very life essence. Some people might call it soul, others awareness, others God, I call it very simply, love or connection. We ALL have this in us and we also all have our own unique colouring, given to us by our genetics, our heritage, and our early experiences. And yes, we can work with the colouring, and we can manage it (why else go to therapy or journal or meditate or build insight in any way?) and maybe even change it a bit, but we must stop striving to be fixed and instead learn to live with our colour/s and in doing that, we might taste the pure water of our essence anyway.

And to those of us who are teachers or guides, we must stop promising outcomes and instead encourage curiosity, compassion and courage on the journey. We must remember to shift from “fault” to “responsibility” and empower others to manage thier own development and ultimately, health. This is the gift of awareness, the gift of seeing clearly the Truth of reality and then responding to this with wisdom and kindness.

Check out my free meditations on Insight Timer and the YOU ARE LOVED podcast (via Apple podcasts and Spotify) – reminding us all that love is always available to us, if only we stop and connect to it.

Buzzy or Fuzzy?

Why Anxiety and Depression are different sides of the same coin and why we must adopt a mind/body approach to our education, treatment and management of these mental health conditions.

 “But what are you thinking Dad?”

 I would persist as I perched on the end of the bed as he lay slumped there, staring at the ceiling, “nothing” would be his whispered response, “I just feel numb”.  My Dad has lived with clinical depression for 25 years and he is still trying to understand why he has it and how it works.

As a psychologist, trained and working in Cognitive Behavioural therapy or CBT, I tried desperately to help him to identify his irrational thoughts so we could uncover some of his core beliefs. But he gave me nothing to work with - if there are no thoughts, what can we do? There was nothing to analyze!

Over the last 25 years I have played a massive part in Dad’s mental health journey, there have been moments I have been dismayed and horrified at the treatments that have been offered to him and times I have been overcome with gratitude for the love and care he has been shown by some of our medical professionals.

I have also worked professionally in mental health and have been faced with my own periods of anxiety, burn out and depression.  There are many wonderful techniques we can learn and practice to nourish our psychological wellbeing (such as CBT) and for some, they may well be enough to stop and even reverse experiences of anxious and depressive responses to life’s challenges.

There is however, one big gaping hole in the way we treat and talk about mental health.

 This gaping hole is the body.

When we think of mental illness, we can think about broken brains. How much do we really know about the role of the body, when it comes to depression and anxiety? Surely there is wisdom in the word “depressed”, it sounds quite like “deep rest” to me (Jim Carey) – could it just be that it is our body asking for some down time?

 Did you know, more information travels up from the body to the brain than the brain to the body? And, as the primary job of the brain is to make meaning out of things, we often create stories (usually based on our past experiences) around the information that is coming up from our body.

“Tight chest? Must be nervous about x, y or z”.

“Churning tummy? It must be that this job/person/experience is not safe”.

Sometimes these body messages are spot on (they can point us to our values and our intuition) but other times they are very inaccurate. They can be a result of unresolved past experiences playing out in unhelpful ways in the present. If our past has been unsafe in some way, we, through no fault of our own, may unconsciously interpret that threatening email from a client as a life-or-death situation or that sideways glance from a stranger as a threat to our safety. In response to these events and our thoughts about these events, our body switches on its survival response (fight/flight) and because we are often completely unaware of it, we don’t turn it off. Many of us live weeks, months or years in this anxious survival state, until one day (depending upon our history and our genetics) it all comes crumbling down and we slide (or crash!) into clinical depression. The body has come to our rescue and slowed us down for us. It has slammed on the breaks and said “OK, REST! Now!”.

We must start including the body in meaningful ways when it comes to diagnosis, education and treatment for depression and anxiety. We need to learn how to accurately interpret these messages from the finely tuned (albeit sometimes out of whack) instrument that is our body.

As the body’s language is feelings, we must be educating ourselves and our children in this ancient language.

Intellectually, it makes absolutely no sense that those of us who experience anxiety are also more prone to depression – I mean they seem like the opposite thing! One is up, the other is down. One is future-focused, one is past – focused. Anxiety often carries with it thoughts like:

“What will happen if I fail?”

“It has to be perfect”

“It’s all going to go wrong!”

Whereas thoughts associated with depression are more along the lines of:

“I don’t care - what’s the point anyway?”

“I can’t believe I said/did/wore that!”

“I am so hopeless; I will never get anywhere/fit in”

Opposites, right? Yes, but intimately connected by one very cool system in our body – our autonomic nervous system (ANS) and specifically the vagus nerve. It is no coincidence that the pharmacological treatment for anxiety is often the same as that for depression. A very clever human by the name of Dr Stephen Porges has been able to explain to us, for the very first time, why anxiety and depression go hand in hand.  His theory is the Polyvagal Theory and I encourage you to do some of your own research into his work.

 Without getting too technical (to be honest I am still learning it all myself!), we have two branches of our ANS, both very important for our survival and thriving. The balance of these two branches may well be one way to define “wellbeing”.

The first branch is called the sympathetic nervous system or SNS, this is responsible for the very important survival or fight/flight response. Many of us perfectionists out there are very familiar with this branch, it is the one that keeps us alert and go, go, going. It can make us “buzzy” and incredibly productive, it can be fun and rather addictive spending time here. We need this system to survive (like to get out of bed and get going!) and stay safe (like jump out of the way of an oncoming bus) but unfortunately, for some of us (due to trauma, genetics or modelling by our primary caregivers) this system is stuck on “on” and we find ourselves in a perpetual state of stress and anxiety, not just in our brains (racing thoughts) but in our body (tight heart, brick in tummy, short breath) too.

The second system is the parasympathetic nervous system or PNS. This fabulous piece of artwork is responsible for the “rest and digest” functions in the body. When we are in a PNS dominant state we sleep well, heal well and digest well. We respond instead of react and we recover quickly from the inevitable challenges life throws at us.

 The bit of new information that we are only just now understanding is that the PNS has two of its own branches, both are important but sometimes inappropriately used; I’m going to call them the “Connect” and the “Disconnect” branches. Both help slow and settle a frazzled system, but they do it in different ways.

 We are born with an undeveloped “Connect” branch, we need to build it from scratch. We build it through interaction with our environment – from the modelling of our primary caregivers, from their touch, facial expressions and tone of voice. When they smile and speak softly and calmly, we are soothed and settled and we start to internalize the belief that the world is safe and, as we grow up, we can calm ourselves and recover quickly from stressful events. Awesomely, it can be toned through activities such as meditation and other mind/body approaches (yoga, breath practices, chanting etc.) as well as building meaningful relationships (which, cruelly, can be hard if we have had an unsupportive environment in our childhood). If our primary caregivers were stressed out themselves, our own development of this calming, soothing “connect” branch may be compromised.

 The “Disconnect” branch of the PNS, also known as the “shutdown” branch is wired into us from birth, it is our “default mode” and evolution has shown us that it is necessary for our survival. When we cry as babies, and our cries are regularly not attended to - what do we do? We shutdown. We switch off and we go to sleep. Our Disconnect PNS comes in and short circuits our over-activated SNS (fight/flight or stress) in an effort to help us to survive. It is like our “off” switch. Having this “off” switch activated some of the time is no big deal, in fact, we want it to be on a little bit, but we certainly don’t want it to be the dominant branch of the PNS as we certainly don’t want to be switched “off” all the time. This is often referred to as the “freeze” response. Frozen is certainly what depression can feel like for many of us. When we are in this state, we stop thinking (we get a fuzzy head), feeling, tasting, smelling, digesting, connecting with others and we can tend to either under or over-sleep.

And that, my friends is why my dear old Dad has no conscious thoughts when he is clinically depressed.

The “Disconnect” branch of his PNS comes on and his system goes into “shutdown” and, as far as his unconscious mind and his beautiful body is concerned, this is an issue of life or death. After a period of intense stress, his body is trying to help him to get out of fight/flight by slamming on the “freeze” function – it is trying to help. And this has been his unconscious habit for around 76 years. He disconnects for his very survival. This is not his fault or his choice, his body chooses for him. It is like pressing the “eject” button of a crashing plane, he just leaves his body. His body has needed to choose for him to keep him safe while growing up with an anxious/angry father and then choosing (unconsciously of course) adult relationships that kept him in this state of fight/flight. Sadly, we seem to choose the familiar over the healthy. He was always loved but his system never felt safe. Not as a child and not as an adult.

 So, this is the missing piece to my puzzle. This information changed everything for me when it comes to understanding why anxiety and depression often go hand-in-hand and why cultivating a sense of connection is such a powerful ally on our journey to wellbeing.

 Cultivating a sense of connection is such a powerful ally on our mental health journey

So what can we do to support ourselves and our loved ones to build capacity to self-sooth through engaging the “Connect” side of the PNS? We can do a lot! It takes time to tone the nervous system, but it can be done. Here are some ideas that continue to help me and I am sharing with my clients (and my dear old Dad):

-       Mindfulness – we need to spend time getting to know ourselves, our mind, our body and our hearts. Mindfulness is the loving light of awareness and through simply paying clear and kind attention to our internal and external experiences, we can make wiser choices to support ourselves and manage our stress response (and perfectionistic tendencies…just as an example!). We can become aware of our automatic thoughts and start to disentangle these from our emotions and our bodies. We can start to live in the beauty of the present rather than be at the mercy of the memories of the past.

-       Meditate – we have the science now that shows us that meditation fundamentally changes the way our mind/body/heart function. It, of course is not a silver bullet but it is an important part to our healing as it supports us to create our own internal place of safety and connection, our own refuge from the inevitable storms of life. We can become our own friend and we can remember the strength and sovereignty that is our birthright.

-       Body practices – do what works for you and do it consciously; yoga, tai chi, swimming, running – we have to come back to the power of the body and start to listen to her whisper. We can learn from her wisdom and start to heal the patterns we may have learned or inherited that are no longer serving us.

-       Relationships – “Connection, the ability to feel connected, is neurobiologically wired, that is why we are here” (Brene Brown). The quality of our relationships is the strongest predictor of happiness and wellbeing for us humans. This has been well-documented many times over. We now know why; through the “connect” branch of the PNS, other humans soothe our frazzled nervous systems and bring our bodies/minds/hearts back into balance. We move from buzzy and fuzzy to clear, calm and connected. In this digital world, we MUST make time to cultivate love, belonging and connection.We can also create a sense of deep connection within ourselves through mindfulness, meditation and self-compassion practices.

Dad’s relationships have always been strong, he has swathes of friends as he is a beautiful human who is funny and smart and loving. These relationships continue to be important to him and I have no doubt have been a powerful medicine to him over the years. My deepest wish for him is that somehow, someday, he can feel self-love. A love deep in his bones and one day feel a deep sense of safety and peace.

 This article is the tip of the iceberg, there is so much more for all of us (me included!) to learn but what we can do NOW is practice. We can love ourselves and each other madly and deeply, we can remember we belong to something bigger than ourselves and that actually, at the end of the day connection is all that matters.

 Check out my free meditations on Insight Timer and the YOU ARE LOVED podcast (via Apple podcasts and Spotify) – reminding us all that love is always available to us, if only we stop and connect to it.

Now is where it is at

How mindfulness might help Melbourne ride yet another lockdown

 “It all feels a little PTSDish” said a friend of mine as we debriefed about Melbourne’s latest lockdown. From the Beyond Blue website:

“Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a particular set of reactions that can develop in people who have been through a traumatic event which threatened their life or safety, or that of others around them. This could be a car or other serious accident, physical or sexual assault, war or torture, or disasters such as bushfires or floods. As a result, the person experiences feelings of intense fear, helplessness or horror.” 

PTSD is not a term to be used lightly, the condition can, has and does create living hell for many people across our precious globe. We cannot deny however, that for many, this “circuit breaker” lockdown viscerally brings flooding back a sense of fear, helplessness or horror.

We all know by now that our individual experience of this global pandemic is unique. No one has quite the same set of circumstances; kids/no kids, elderly relatives or not, more work/less work, domestic stressors, underlying health (physical and mental) conditions or all/none of the aforementioned. It is unlikely however that anyone, in the world, has got away with being unaffected by Covid19, for better or for worse.

How can mindfulness help us to ride this most recent blip? How can it help us to allow, inhabit and let go of some of the reactions that some might akin to PTSD? Well, mindfulness teaches us to be here now. Not replaying stories of the past or fantasizing (regardless of how alluring that may be) possibilities of the future. And research tells us (Killingsworth et al, Harvard, 2010) that when we live in the present moment – when we meet the actual life that is here before us, we are more likely to be happy.

And research tells us (Killingsworth et al, Harvard, 2010) that when we live in the present moment – when we meet the actual life that is here before us, we are more likely to be happy.

Practical Tips for Us

1.     Fact or Fiction? - Feel your feelings and then take some time to identify the thoughts/stories to which they are attached. When we notice that familiar feeling of say, dread come over us (the mere mention of home learning makes my tummy twist!) can we sense into the internal commentary that is running in the background of our mind?

• What are the thoughts that have come before the dread (or other emotion)?

• Are the thoughts based in fact, or are they just stories we are creating (usually based on our past experiences)?

• It can be helpful to sort the facts from our own internal fiction by simply asking – what is ACTUALLY happening here and now?

One sure truth is that everything changes, including us and we may be wise to attend to what is happening within and around us (and our kids!) now, rather than slipping back into what was true many months ago.

 2.     Meditate – Mindfulness meditation is not typically done to relax (while this can be a lovely and most welcome side effect), it is done to wake up to ourselves and our life as we find them – exactly as they are. The process of sitting in meditation and watching our wonderful mind ziz-zag, dance, belly flop or float all goes towards the process of building our self-awareness. It is only with self-awareness that we can navigate our life with wisdom – otherwise we can tend to mindlessly wander around bumping into the same old fears/beliefs or opinions. Smiling Mind and Headspace are my two favourite mindfulness meditation apps.

 It is only with self-awareness that we can navigate our life with wisdom

3.     Be Kind – Kindness really is one of our human superpowers. It engages a whole heap of fabulous neurochemistry in our brain and bodies and creates space for pure magic. Ways to be kind:

• To Yourself: Smile when you look in the mirror, give yourself a hug (for at least 30 seconds), put your hand on your heart and whisper sweet nothings; “I know this is hard, you are doing so well, you will get through this”

• To Others: Very simply, make the generous assumption that people are doing the best they can at any given time – it makes life better for everyone (thanks Dr Brene Brown). And then of course there are the simple and practical things we can do like; letting someone in front of us in traffic, dropping flowers to a friend or neighbour or checking in on a friend or relative via an impromptu phone call (I know phone calls can be terrifying where we have to speak to an actual person, but we are amazing and exceptional circumstances such as a global pandemic require us to step up and do these things!)

 Of course, however, mindfulness is not the answer to everything (in fact nothing is the answer to everything!) and if you do feel yourself being sucked into a hole of despair now, or any time, reach out for help. You are absolutely not alone in these feelings of fear, hopelessness or horror and there are people out there who understand and can help.

Beyond Blue https://www.beyondblue.org.au/ is a fabulous free resource that we have here in Australia or get along to your local GP for a referral to a mental health professional. We all have mental health, the same way we all have physical health, and we can each create our own personal recipe for wellbeing, of which mindfulness might be just one part.

Italy, Reverse Culture Shock & The Power of Connection

When I was 19, I had the fabulously fortuitous experience of spending 6 months living in Italy. I ate, drank and tried to smoke (unsuccessfully!) like an Italian. Looking back, I am pretty sure I was depressed in my first month or so there, although we called it “culture shock” back then. I slept a hell of a lot and was desperately missing my friends, family and freedom (I was living with an Italian host family and went back to high-school, so had all of a sudden become a kid again). After a while though, I settled into life there and embraced the rich culture and incredible experiences Italy offered. Hello pasta, wine, gelato, midday naps and churches.  Hello soccer matches, Sunday strolls, handsome men and vespa rides!

When the 6 months was over, I was so looking forward to coming home, to going back to my Australian life, my car and my friends. However, upon my return, I realised that I had come back into my familiar environment as an entirely different person. I had changed and grown, and my regular life simply had not – I just didn’t fit anymore.

However, upon my return, I realised that I had come back into my familiar environment as an entirely different person. I had changed and grown, and my regular life simply had not – I just didn’t fit anymore.

After some research, I discovered the name of psychological experience I was having. It was called Reverse Culture Shock. “Reverse culture shock is the emotional and psychological distress suffered by some people when they return home after extensive time overseas. This can result in unexpected difficulty in readjusting to the culture and values of the home country, now that the previously familiar has become unfamiliar.”

I have been reflecting on this lately as, here in Victoria, we look towards Covid19 restrictions being lifted as we move out of lockdown and return to a more familiar way of life. I have this very odd internal conflict; I want the lockdown to lift but I am a little terrified of going back to “normal”.

I have this very odd internal conflict; I want the lockdown to lift but I am a little terrified of going back to “normal”.

After 6 months, we have all adapted to this once-strange way of life. A life that is slower and simpler. That is what we humans do so well, we adapt – even when the scenario we find ourselves in is not fun or even healthy. Collectively, we have been through such trauma this year, that we will be irrevocably changed – we will re-enter our once-familiar “normal”, but we will be different. Individually, each of us has faced our own challenges, with our own flavor of emotions ranging from grief to anger but always underpinned by fear.

My terror ranges from worrying about wearing pants with zips and buttons again, to fear around how I will re-establish my social life, to trepidation when I think about going back to the pace of pre-lockdown life with playdates and after-school activities and family catch ups and work travel. Of course, these fears are completely irrational but, fear can be like that. Fear can take hold of us and whisk us away in its dramatic dance and offer us the illusion of security and control. The truth is, we can’t control anything and, we never really could.

Fear can take hold of us and whisk us away in its dramatic dance and offer us the illusion of security and control. The truth is, we can’t control anything and, we never really could.

So, as we (ever so slowly) move towards a version of our “normal” lives, let’s be really gentle with ourselves and with each other. We have changed and grown over the past months (for better or for worse) and as such, the transition back into a version of pre-Covid life is likely to range from feeling shocking or depressing to simply a little uncomfortable, for many of us.

Let’s talk about our fears, as irrational and confusing as they may seem, for through sharing these confusing and conflicting experiences, we feel less alone. And once again, we remember that we belong to each other. We remember that we are, in fact, not crazy, we are just human. We are just beautiful humans trying to adapt and trying to make sense of a rather senseless world.

We remember that we are, in fact, not crazy, we are just human. We are just beautiful humans trying to adapt and trying to make sense of a rather senseless world.

Of course, at 19, I eventually re-adjusted to life here in Australia – where we don’t nap in the middle of the day or go for meandering strolls on a Sunday afternoon. I reintegrated back into my “normal” life. We, with kindness and patience and gentleness (and a touch of humour) will do the same as we enter this “Covid normal” world. Side by side (socially-distanced, of course).

Read the Goddamn Book

Navigating burnout through Self-compassion, Fact Checking, Rest and Boundaries

Burnout and I are very well acquainted.  We have danced together often and, if/when I forget all the things I know (and teach!), we still dance occasionally. It takes one to know one, and I am seeing the symptoms of burnout everywhere at the moment. In my friends, in my kids, in the dude who owns the local burger bar – all at different stages and all with slightly different symptoms, but all finding themselves in some kind of struggle.

As the bizarre year of 2020 continues to unfold, and we find ourselves faced with new and sometimes scary or overwhelming circumstances, I am noticing us struggling with the emotional ups and downs of this time. So many big emotions can leave our beautiful bodies exhausted and we can be left wondering “why am I so tired?”.

 We also find ourselves faced, well, with ourselves. There is very little to distract us from our own fears and neuroses or from the continual “what if?” thinking that whirrs and whirrs around our minds all day (and all night!). With very few answers and very little clarity on what the future holds - we find ourselves in these “thought loops”.  

I wonder if now might be a really good time to get to know ourselves and our habits more intimately – many of us have the time, if we make it. We can build our self-awareness through meditation, therapy, journaling, chatting to friends and loved ones – there are a lot of roads to the same destination.

 I would like to share some of the very specific things that continue to help me to manage my levels of energy and motivation. But first, here are some reminders of the things we may have heard before, but are worth mentioning again (you know, with COVID brain - we forget stuff!):

BODY

1. Activity - Exercise - 20-30 mins a day

2. Nutrition - Make sure our nutritional needs are sorted (try to reduce alcohol which is a depressant and coffee which is a stimulant - perpetuating the states of emotional ups and downs that we are trying to treat by drinking wine/coffee!)

3. Sleep – get 7-9 hours a night - Google “sleep hygiene tips”

MIND

1. Thoughts and emotions - track them and mind your mind. Which thoughts/emotions are we feeding?

2. Mindfulness - Try some meditation – download the Smiling Mind app, it’s free

3. Mindset - Cultivate a positive mindset – gratitude, kindness and awe are our superpowers

HEART

1. Values – remember the most important thing/s

2. Others - Connect to someone else every day – family/friends or even a neighbour

3. Self – take a few minutes a day to feel yourself in your body, to feel your ‘home’, you could even say a gentle ‘hello me’ and if you are feeling brave ‘hello me, I love you”

Now, here are the mental health heavy-hitters when we feel burnout arriving or looming. I have also suggested some little sayings (affirmations or mantas, if you like) that we may all like to bring into our minds and hearts to support us to ride these emotional waves.

1.     Self-Compassion – “I have my own back”

Many of us are so hard on ourselves. This is not our fault, setting high standards has had massive evolutionary benefits (like, being the most powerful species on earth!) but it also has its downsides (like zapping our vital energy when we continually berate ourselves). So, can we lean towards loving (or even liking) ourselves as much as we do our friends or our kids? Can we remind ourselves that we have our own back? That we have done and felt hard things before and we can do it again? Becoming my own best friend is the most radical and transformative thing I have ever done, it allows me to take care of myself. Please try it.

2.     Fact Check - “Is it true?”

Our beautiful minds create stories to explain the unexplainable – it is part of their job. I don’t know about you, but I am finding myself faced with many confusing or unexplainable things at the moment, like:

-       Being told to stay home and not see loved ones - weird

-       Wearing a sweaty piece of cloth on my face which is rubbing makeup off my red nose - embarrassing

-       Being a school teacher and debating with my kid about….too much to add in this blog

-       Preparing my 10000th meal in one day - annoying

So, when I find myself creating stories to explain these very odd circumstances like “I have no friends, life or career, I hate my clothes and I will never have time to myself again”, I stop and check the facts and the evidence.  Usually I have let myself jump on a train of catastrophizing or blaming - no wonder I find myself freaked out or bummed out.  So, to pull ourselves back, we can ask the simple question “is it true?”. Usually it isn’t and man, that is good news. Credit to Byron Katie for this magic question.

3.     Rest - “Read the goddamn book”

Many of us simply don’t know how to rest and rest is absolutely what our bodies need at the moment – to recover from 6 months of fear-induced adrenaline running through our system. Please allow yourself to rest. Do a Yoga Nidra deep relaxation (find one on YouTube or Insight Timer), take a nap or read a goddamn book. Do these during the day, walk away from the emails/phone calls/washing or children and take 15 minutes to rest.  The world will keep spinning without us – I promise.

 4.     Set Boundaries - “No, I value myself more than I value your opinion of me”

Listen to yourself and your needs and if something doesn’t work for you, say so and say no. This is a marathon, not a sprint, we need to keep ourselves well for the long run.

There is no denying it, things are weird, sometimes scary and often annoying but I do know, from my own experience, that we always have a choice when it comes to how we respond to the world and the challenges we face. Please take good care of you and your little people, love yourself stupid and rest like your health depends on it.

Minecraft and Dark Chocolate

How savouring, awe, gratitude and kindness might just be our superpowers to support us to navigate Covidland with more grace and ease

Honestly, I have always had a mild distaste for “positive thinking”. When I see those “Good Vibes Only” t-shirts, I think “But what about the bad vibes, where the hell do we put those?”

I can’t stand those rosy perfect people – you know the ones; always looking on the bright side. Everything is always great in their life, their kids are well-behaved, they love their job, they have time (and desire) to make wholesome nutritious meals for their family every night and they have perfect, perfect hair. I want none of it. I want to hear about the Full Catastrophe; the icky, murky, hairy stuff we don’t usually speak about. The stuff that is reserved for those private moments or journal entries. The secrets that are whispered in dark corners, after perhaps too much red wine.

I guess that is part of the reason I became a psychologist. I get to sit with people and help them to peer under their own veneer of perfection, in much the same way I have had to peer under my own over the many years I have lived with this body/mind/heart.

The thing is though, if we only focus on the icky, mucky, sticky stuff we probably only find more icky, mucky, sticky stuff. It is the way us humans are put together, we are hard-wired to focus on the negative. I don’t know about you, but I certainly don’t have to look too far at the moment for the negative - it is right at my doorstep and my guess is, it is right there at yours too.

Our world is going through a pretty interesting time which means we are going through a pretty interesting time as, of course, we are all intricately connected. So, while I am absolutely not suggesting we all jump online and buy “Good Vibes Only” t-shirts, we do need to mind ourselves pretty closely to ensure we don’t get swept up into the spiral of negativity and whisked away to the Nether (sorry, my kids are playing way too much Minecraft and the Nether is a world – from what I can gather!).

So, how can we mind ourselves?

How can we keep going while, at times, it feels like the world is crumbling around us?

Now is the time to bring in our real superpowers; we need to feed the good, we need to search for it and when we find it, we need to savour it. It is there, it is just hiding in the everyday moments that, in the hustle and bustle of our pre-Covid lives, we may have missed and now, in Covidland, we can’t seem to find the good at all.

Feed the Feels

Savouring is one of my favorite mindfulness practices. It is simply feeling the good feels we naturally feel but feeding them – feeding the feels! So, in the morning, when you have your first cup of coffee/tea – practice savouring it, hang on to the good feelings and the pleasure a little longer than usual. You can savour the smile of your child, the spring in your dog’s step or the feel of clean sheets as you slide into bed. In fact I practiced today with 3 or maybe 4 pieces of dark chocolate (note: you really only need 1 but, who is counting?)

Awwwww with Awe

Most of us take ourselves and our lives way too personally and way too seriously. We think we are the centre of it all and all of this inconvenience we are currently facing (wearing masks, home-schooling the kids, not seeing our nearest and dearest….the list can go on) is personal. It is not, none of it is personal, it just is. A great way to regain perspective and remember our place is letting awe and wonder creep into our system. Awe and wonder are experiences that happen when we are faced with something greater than ourselves – nature is a great place to start. Go outside and spend some time being in awe of the majesty of the clouds or head into a park and bask in the glory of an old gum tree. If looking outside isn’t your thing, you might like to look inside and explore meditation. The unending expanse and limitless nature of our very own mind or the intricacy of our very own body are both indeed worthy of our wonder and our awe.

How Lucky are We?

My beautiful late mum had many catch phrases, but I think my favourite was “how lucky are we?”. She used to spray that phrase with great abandon; scones, jam and cream = “how lucky are we?”, lovely sunset = “how lucky are we?”, a great meal with friends = “how lucky are we?”. She certainly lived with an attitude of gratitude and I have no doubt her mindset served her well during many years of ill-health. Plenty has been written about the benefits of gratitude on our mental and physical health (a google search of “gratitude research” will yield a plethora of resources) so it is absolutely part of the heavy artillery we can all be drawing on right now. Again, not to ignore the pain we are experiencing, simply to see the whole picture of rich, beautiful, hard, funny life; the full catastrophe.

A Kind Connection

Did you know we have a whole network in our brain (and body to be accurate) that is there for the purpose of social connection? Did you also know that accessing this same network is one of the quickest ways to settle our frazzled nerves and spinning mind? How cool is that?! Now, connection really is the key thing we are all missing at the moment as we navigate Covidland. We might need to get a little creative to get our chemical connection kick – here are some ideas:

• Reach out to friends and family using different media;

o   send a text/snail-mail letter/email,

o   do a zoom coffee/drink or

o   drop off some cupcakes/cookies/bunch of flowers from your garden

• Make conscious choices about your use of social media – we go on there looking for a connection hit, but often leave feeling somewhat unsatisfied and sometimes even emptier than before.

• Give your dog, partner, children, teddy-bear, rolled-up blanket or yourself more hugs than ever – at least 3 x 30 seconds per day is my recommendation, but feel free to double the dose!

Now, none of this is to downplay the incredibly difficult situation we are all in. It is important we feel the grief and loss that is right at our doorstep. It is also important we don’t get sucked into its swamp. Us humans tend to forget one of the capital T Truths that is as old as time – everything changes, this will too. We have no idea what will be on the other side of this experience, in the meantime, there is savouring, awe, gratitude and kindness (and a dash of Minecraft and dark chocolate thrown in too) to get us by.

Puppy School for The Mind

Training ourselves and our kids with kindness and patience to really meet the “full catastrophe” of life

 I was walking along the beach this morning (doing my arm exercises to rehab a dislocated shoulder – yes, I looked ridiculous) and saw a fellow coming towards me with a big dog. When the dog saw me, he stopped and started tugging on the lead and tried to get away.

We have a new puppy. Part of our learning in puppy school is that we need to introduce our pup to as many weird and wonderful things as we can, to get them used to the whole plethora of experiences they will face as life goes on for them in the world outside of their litter mates.

 The trainer suggested the following:

“socialize your puppy by introducing him/her to trucks, motorbikes, scooters, people in hoods/hats/masks, bikes, bins, lawn mowers, vacuum cleaners, people with walkers, people from different nationalities, people waving their arms around, prams, loud kids, running kids, crawling kids, friendly kids, big dogs, small dogs. And, every time they see something new, reassure them it is OK and then give them a reward”. Makes sense I thought. Good advice.

So, seeing this guy struggling to control his big dog when it saw a crazy lady whirling her arms around, I thought about puppy school and put my arms down and pretended to be normal person (quite hard for me really). As I came up to the guy and his dog and to show some compassion (you know, all in it together), I said “we have a new puppy and it is really hard to teach them to walk on a lead isn’t it?!”. He kind of looked at me sideways (possibly able to tell that even with arms by my side I am still not a normal person!) and then said “yeah, well if you hadn’t been waving your arms around, he would not have freaked out”. And we both kept walking. “Now that is interesting” I thought. He was blaming me for his dog’s poor behaviour….

 In my work at a university, we teach the students to train their minds in the same way they would train a puppy; firmly but lovingly. And after this morning’s interaction with this young fellow and his very big dog, I got thinking about how quick so many of us are to blame others for our own mind’s behaviour.

 “You made me feel….” “You made me do…..”

 The truth is, no one makes us think, feel or do anything. An untrained mind, much like an untrained dog, does not realise it has a choice. The fact is, it does. We always have a choice when it comes to how we respond to a situation. We absolutely cannot choose the situations we find ourselves in and we can pretty much guarantee that we will all find ourselves in less than fabulous situations in our life, but we can all choose how we meet each and every experience.

 Mindfulness meditation is like puppy school for the mind, body and heart. We expose our full self to all sorts of weird and wonderful things: memories, worries, sadness, fear, love, self-loathing - you name it, the “full catastrophe” to quote Jon Kabat-Zinn. And we do that in a kind and patient way. Much like a new puppy, we slowly learn that these things are all just part of a colourful life and they are not to be afraid of. They are to be inquired into with an open and curious attitude. When we approach ourselves and life in this way, even the most painful experiences can become a wellspring of knowledge and wisdom.

 The same goes for the way we parent our kids. If we protect them too much and don’t let them learn to navigate fear and boredom and sadness for themselves, we are depriving them of learning that they are capable to hold all of life – right within them.

 Of course, there are times when the most compassionate thing to do for ourselves is in fact to turn away, to avoid or even numb, to flick on Netflix or have another piece of chocolate. Sometimes stuff gets so big that Netflix and chocolate is actually the most appropriate response – until we are ready to turn towards it. The same goes for our kids – sometimes flicking on the television to quell the tears is the best thing to do. In much the same way, it would be negligent to leave a new small dog alone with a big untrained dog – it would simply do more damage than good. We can all deal with really big stuff, but only when we are ready and have some good resources to support us.

 So, as we venture into our own minds, hearts and bodies – can we meet whatever we find there with kindness? Can we reassure ourselves that we are OK and we can in fact handle this? We can handle all of this messiness of being human. The same goes for our kids, can we teach them that yes, their pain is big but they are bigger? The trick is, we all need to get to know our pain, in much the same way my new puppy needs to get to know all of life, so she does not freak out when she comes face to face with new and possibly scary things.

 And, if you see a lady walking along the beach waving her arms around like crazy, it’s possibly me. Please come and say hi.

Thank You, My Friend

She stands beside me and we smile,

Knowing we belong to each other,

Her and I, she and me.

She trusts me, with all of my funny quirks, so completely.

She rushes to soothe my bleeding knee or aching pride,

As I lie bruised and tired from rushing too fast or trying too hard,

She reminds me I am already perfect,

And, that they are too.

She shows me the purple clouds of the sunset,

And the sweetness in the tea,

And she whispers gently in my ear,

How lucky are we?

She waits patiently when I forget all the things,

As I often do.

And she lovingly welcomes me back home when I finally remember.

She stands beside me, inside me,

Always there to love and guide me.

She is pure, open, clear and kind,

She is my heart, body, and my mind.

She is me, she is you too.

We belong to each other,

So, thank you, thank you, thank you.

Time for My Song

And the lid goes back on the box once more,

As I dress the kids to get them out the door,

I swallow down my dreams and my ideas,

My visions, my passions and even my fears.

Time, time, where is the time?

To claim, to pursue, to hunt down what is mine?

Where is the freedom to sing my own song?

That’s been bubbling inside of me all along.

Waiting, waiting to be sung,

While I cook, and fold, and make cookies,

That’s “fun”?!

These little people need to be fed,

They need to be loved,

And put to bed.

They need to be seen and need to belong,

But in this whole process,

Where is MY song?

I have come to discover,

Our song must be sung,

But that the form it is sung in,

There’s much more than one.

The notes can be woven in the way that we talk,

The tune can be heard in the way that we walk.

And so, it’s damn balance,

As all good things are,

And if we walk on this tightrope,

We’re bound to go far.

And we might first fall one way,

And then to the other,

And sometimes we wonder,

Why do I bother?

We bother because we have a song to be sung,

And the world, it is waiting,

And we’re just the one.

Home Schooling - A Path to Enlightenment?

I have not liked most parts of home schooling.

This is mainly because the whole process has tugged on all of my perfectionistic and people-pleasing neuroses and lay them out for the world (and myself and my kids) to see. This only occurred to me while I was feverishly posting evidence of my grade 1s activity on the school app and then checking constantly as to whether the teacher had “liked” it. Oh my goodness. I am not in grade 1, why do I care what Catherine (teacher) thinks of me? Why do I care what anyone thinks of me?

I have come to believe that the only thing that really matters is what I think of me.

I feel like the last 3 months of my life have required me to dig very deep into my self-care, insight & emotional management tool kits, not to mention my interpersonal tools. It is like I have been on a very long, not-self-imposed Zen retreat. With a slightly irritable and irrational grade 1 Zen master whipping me as I climb a very tall mountain, in the rain, naked. THAT is how hard it has been, so so many opportunities for insight and development and so so many opportunities for crumbling into a puddle of frustrated and angry goop, right here on the kitchen floor. Of course, in reality, most of the time, it was my own dear mind who was the old Zen master. Dammit, those realisations hurt.

Someone asked me the other day “how is home schooling going?” I paused, she jumped in and said, “I am sure there are some lovely bits”. My response was a very definite “no, there have been not been many lovely bits, I have actually dreaded most mornings at 9am when we are supposed to start ‘school’. I have had to constantly check myself as to whether I am going too hard or too soft, I have had to constantly remember what really matters at the end of all this (mental health and connection!)  and I am currently measuring the success of my days in terms of whether I killed or divorced anyone”. She was silent (and perhaps a little shocked) and she finally said, “oh well, at least you’re honest”. I could tell she was a little disappointed that I wasn’t more up-beat about the whole thing, I mean, I am a psychologist and meditation teacher after all – aren’t I supposed to be positive? Or at least have my shit together?

I have spent a great portion of my life not being honest about my feelings and, pretending to have my shit together. As women, and especially as mothers, society demands us to be smiling and grateful and to just get on with it. Of course, I am grateful, my life is awesome but, that does not diminish my pain and discomfort. In fact, I have now come to believe that pain and discomfort is necessary for us to truly grow into who we are supposed to be. And that all of this avoiding of pain and discomfort does us as a massive disservice. We then pass down this way of seeing and being to our kids, which, in turn does them a massive disservice. We gotta teach ourselves (and our kids) how to ride the pain and discomfort that comes with being a fully functioning human, not how to hide it and especially not how to fix it.

 I think this starts when we are little girls, when we are taught to be nice and quiet and pretty and well-behaved. We swallow down our feelings (unless of course they are the “positive” ones like happiness and joy) and eventually, they lodge themselves in our bodies. The mind/body connection is alive and well here, I can assure you. Our anger or fear or shame sits in our gut, churning, churning, churning – largely unacknowledged or unexpressed. Angry women are dismissed as aggressive or neurotic, or lesbian (as if that were an insult).

If we do somehow manage to keep a lid on it, sometimes these emotions seep out, trickling and whirling as insecurities or irritability or unexplainable tears. We wonder why rates of burn-out, anxiety, depression and autoimmune disease are higher in women!

As my sister in law pointed out to me the other day, women are the biggest losers in this global pandemic. Women make up most of the part time or less-skilled workforce and they are largely the ones who have lost their jobs due to the economic crunch we all find ourselves in. They are also largely the ones who have been tasked with homeschooling the kids, putting their careers on hold, once again (and having the Zen-retreat-like experience described above). Please be assured this is not having a go at men. Men are bloody awesome, it is not their fault that we all live in a largely patriarchal society set up by and for men. However, is sure as hell is their responsibility to be aware of what is happening here and, to step in to support and work with the women in their lives, at home and at work.

And so, this is why I am so passionate about running my #mindfulwoman meditation classes every week via zoom. It is an opportunity for women to come together to support and grow and rediscover their awesomeness.  The awesomeness that may have been stifled by society and/or the way they were raised (no fault passing or blame here – just an acknowledgement of reality). No competing, no pretending, no fake smiling or “I’m fine – how are you?”. Just us. As we are. Passionate. Smart. Funny. Whole. Human.

And so, home-schooling ends for some of us next week. However, I know that life will continue to throw me many more opportunities for development and growth. That is what life does. Life wants us to grow into who we are supposed to be, not what we have been told we should be. One thing I am not supposed to be for sure, is a primary school teacher, especially not to my own kids.

Thanks for the memories home schooling, smell ya later!

Leaving home and being saved again and again and again…..

I was 15 and in year 9. He was 17 and in year 12.

I was dating and older boy (eeeeek!) and I felt so cool! Cool was not something that came naturally to me, it was something I desperately wanted to be but, have you met my parents? both not cool. I had no hope. Anyway, he was the best basketball player at school and with that came great prestige. We’ll call him “Matt” (because that may or may not have been his real name). 

One Friday night we went out for dinner with Matt’s parents (slightly weird, I know) and the plan then, was to go onto watch a professional basketball game. I felt so grown up and so excited that this guy must really like me – since he was introducing me to his parents. I remember sitting at dinner, describing in detail the raft making activity I had done at Girl Guides the night before. I was in total flow….I had three grown-ups enthralled in my description of how we built the raft, how we sailed the raft and how we capsized the raft. I actually remember having the conscious thought “wow, I am so uncool (I mean, I go to girl guides for goodness sake) and these people seem to like me anyway - unbelievable”. I was practicing being myself and it felt so new and so good. And even better, the feedback I was getting from “the world” (AKA Matt and his parents) was positive. After dinner we walked across the park towards the basketball stadium. Matt and I were walking slightly behind his parents. I remember the smell of the fig trees, the gentle glow of the street lamps lighting up the crisp winter evening, the warmth of his hand as he held mine. And then, all of a sudden, the unthinkable happened, he broke up with me. In the park, 20 meters behind his parents.

 A little piece of my adolescent self died that night. At that tender age of 15, I learned that actually, being myself is risky, people might leave me if I show them who I really am. Turns out, the break-up was nothing to do with me. Matt had kissed “Shannon” (who just happened to be the fastest runner in the school – damn sporty people sticking together) the night before and she had made him promise to break up with me the next night.

When I got home from that very awkward date (where I had to sit through a whole bloody basketball game with this guy who had just broken up with me AND HIS DAMN PARENTS) – I fell into my Dad’s arms at the front door and sobbed. I could see in his face the firm resolve to do everything he could to protect me from such pain in the future. His little girl was hurting and  he would make sure THAT would never happen again. Of course, this is a natural response from many of us parents, to protect our children from pain – however, I wonder whether it is misguided? Because what I inadvertently learnt from my Dad’s response was “pain is bad, I am weak and I can’t handle my pain therefore I must be protected from it” – and protected by a man, no less.

And so, when pain came in my life, as it inevitably did because, you know “life is suffering” and all that jazz, I became very good at either avoiding the pain and therefore avoiding or leaving myself in the process OR playing the “weak” card and crumbling. I never knew I could turn right towards the pain. I never knew I had a choice when it came to abandoning myself and that, it actually could never destroy me, it could, in fact only ever make me stronger.

And so life went on, I crashed and burned, many times. I left myself over and over and over again. I turned to men to save me. I moved further and further away from my own wisdom – looking outside myself to be fixed, to be saved. Trying to fit myself into boxes that just weren’t the right size or shape for me. And then, I found mindfulness. I finally found an approach that did not require me to fix or change anything, in fact, it encouraged me to be who I really am – wholeheartedly! 

This is why I teach it. This is why I am so passionate about teaching it to woman. We can and must trust and save ourselves and we can and must teach our daughters and sons the same.

Oh, and I did bump into Matt again. It was when I was about 24 and I was on a catwalk, modeling lingerie at a wedding expo. I spotted him in the audience with his fiancé. He was balding.

Meditation and Mindfulness is NOT ENOUGH to get us through Covid19

Meditation and Mindfulness alone is NOT ENOUGH to get us through Covid19, but it sure can help……

The demon, standing at the old door, wailing that it needed it’s fix. It just didn’t want to be tamed. A warrior woman, wielding her sword, standing her ground and owning her power. She struggled and fought with the demon as he tried to wrestle the sword from her grasping hands. All of a sudden, her years of mindfulness training clicked in, the haze lifted, the stories stopped and her presence became broad and open. She could see what was really happening.

A mother, frustrated at her failed attempts to cut, yet another deal, with her 6-year-old to do his damn writing task. A child who just wanted to play one more (educational?) game on the device with which he had become obsessed. A desktop computer flailing in the doorway, uncertain of where it belonged. All of them upset and definitely not being their best-selves. Especially the computer, I mean, what is a desktop computer when not on top of a desk?

The warrior mother was me, the demon 6-year-old was my youngest son.

After the computer wrestling escapade, and my son and I had calmed down and apologized for our behaviour, I reflected. And I called my mates to hear their similar tales of iso insanity (isoanity?) and I jumped onto social media to see what everyone else was up to (I have a social media feed that I have carefully curated to nourish, not undermine, my happiness) and this is what I learned:

• We are all struggling (to different degrees for sure), teaching our kids at home is really bloody hard

• We are all tired and we have no idea why – we are confused, we aren’t doing much but we are so tired – what is wrong with us?

• Some of us cry, periodically through the day – for us, for our kids, for our world and we are too embarrassed to ask if others are crying too

• As women, we find ourselves back in the home, after pushing and dreaming and trying so damn hard to leave it – some of us are resentful and frustrated – where have our careers gone? Where is our freedom? Why must we swallow our passions to make way for maths lessons? Why is it us who have to put our lives on hold - yet again?

This is what I know:

• If you are experiencing it, there is an incredibly high chance other people are too. We are not all that different, you and I. Tell someone.

• We have the option to revisit our expectations and standards. We can ask “do the rules and norms that were in our families 6 weeks ago (pre-Covid19) still apply?” I mean, these are exceptional times, surely, we can make exceptions to some rules? Which rules or expectations do you need to review or tweak?

• When we are stuck in struggle town – one of the worst things we can do is fight it, one of the best things we can do is accept it. When we accept it, we get bigger than it, when we get bigger than it, we stop merging with it and we can, once again, access the wise part of our beautiful human brains (where we house our sense of humour, our creativity, our joy and our capacity for connection and gratitude).

• We are tired because worry and grief and trauma are tiring, so is anger. Big emotions are tiring, fighting big emotions is even more tiring. Can we find ways to express how we are feeling? Call someone to chat about it, write about it in a journal, meditate on it – do anything that works to remember we are not the emotion and that we are bigger and wiser than it. Don’t just bury it because life is messy with big emotions. Life is messy full stop. And the messiness levels have risen exponentially right now, let’s not deny it. Let the emotion out (perhaps just leave the desktop computers plugged into the wall – its better that way, take it from me). And nap, please take naps. Put the kids in front of the TV and nap.

• Women, by and large, are the ones taking on the “home schooling” and extended parenting responsibilities right now and no, this is not fair. However, this is where we find ourselves and the more of us who speak up and express how we feel the more likely things will start to change. Men are good, men love us and want to help us, we just need to teach them how. This is all new for them too. We have to start in our own homes if we want to change a culture. This is a damn big ship to turn around but we gotta start. Connect with other women (you could do that at my weekly Mindful Woman zoom classes). Support your sisters – we are stronger and braver when we are together – even via zoom.

• We need to dig deep on all of our self-care resources now, just the bare minimum will not cut it:

o   drag out the yoga mat and do some online classes,

o   grab an app to learn or revamp your meditation practice (go to the resources page for tips),

o   get out and exercise for 20-30 mins every day (even if that means doing star jumps or squats on your balcony),

o   write a list of 3 things you are grateful for (sounds poxy but we have the science to prove it works),

o   eat fresh nourishing food,

o   communicate with your team (family and friends) about how you are feeling and what you need.

And finally, know when you need extra help from a psychologist or counsellor and go to the GP and get the damn referral. Remember, self-care is not weak or selfish, it allows us to be our best selves (and potentially leave computers in their rightful homes!).

We can do this, I know we can. But let’s please be kind to ourselves and each other (hint: meditation can help build our kindness muscles).  And let’s, for goodness sake, lower our expectations of ourselves and each other. This will all pass and when it does, we want all of our relationships to be intact – they will be important to support us as we re-enter the world and go around madly hugging everyone.

 PS. You know that all of the tips in this blog are for me just as much as you – right? As the saying goes, we teach what we need to learn!!! And the learning continues……

A Loving Ode to Iso

 My legs are hairy,

My hair is grey,

Today feels much like yesterday,

All the days have blurred together,

And now we’re faced with crappy weather,

Zoffee (zoom coffees) catch ups are now a thing,

Who knows what tomorrow will bring?

So much change can leave us reeling,

I’ve been nowhere but I have that jet lagged feeling.

This new reality is very weird,

My husband has even grown a beard,

Nowhere to rush to,

No need to wear clothes,

Nerf wars, “hey google” and craft is how our days go.

From this time, we will be forever changed,

Nothing will ever be the same,

We will have learnt kindness and patience and our deep connection

All because of this viral infection,

We are caring for the old, the sick and the lonely,

By staying grounded and becoming all homely.

We are slowing down and asking what matters

Our view of what’s real is in tatters,

The chasing, the striving, the pushing, must rest,

As humanity rises and does its best

To heal the pain and grief we feel everywhere

We reach out, we love, we show we care.

So from my grey haired, hairy legged house to yours,

Can we just embrace this pause?

Feel it all but stay so very strong,

And remember the loving to which we all belong.

Love without Strings

MINDFULNESS AS A POSSIBLE ROUTE TO UNCOMPLICATED LOVE

My relationship with my late mum was indeed complicated – as mother-daughter relationships often can be.

I always knew she loved me, however, at times, that love seemed to be coupled with a heavy dose of expectation. It felt as though I was expected to be perfect and when I was perfect (which I tried so desperately to be all my life), I was loved more.

Our relationship was one of push and pull. Of advance and retreat. It seemed to be pregnant with competition, it may sound Freudian, but I could honestly feel it. 

My dear mum had her own barrel of crap to deal with, I am not sure she had room on her plate (or in her heart) to deal with any of mine. It would be much easier for her if I were perfect; a nice girl, smart, kind, pretty – all the things nice girls are supposed to be. So, I learnt at a very young age to keep my troubles to myself, to keep my confusions, my traumas, my pain to myself. I worked through it, as best I could with poetry and with friendships, and later in life with approval-seeking and perfectionistic behaviour.

As mum became more and more unwell, she was confined to bed in her dying days. My brother, Dad and I nursed her at home – that is what she wanted, she didn’t want to die in a cold hospital bed. She wanted to die at home, with dignity, in the embrace of the man she loved so deeply.

Those final days together; as I made tea for the guests coming to say their last good-byes, as I put flowers in vases and coordinated the palliative care nurse visits, were some of my most cherished times I had with her. I guess, as we both knew time was scarce, we let our egos melt away and we allowed ourselves to just be together, in pure love. The familiar competition between us evaporated, the expectations ceased to swirl around me and, possibly for the first time – we just were, together. Two women, two mothers, loving each other, completely without strings.

 One morning, after listening to some recorded meditations, she looked up at me and said “I get it, I understand what you have been trying to teach me all these years, I have been nuts all my life and now its too late”. At that point we lovingly embraced each other, knowing it was too late to turn back but also knowing that she had glimpsed the possibility of how life could have been. That experience was one of the most profound and heartbreaking in my life and from it I learnt a lot.

As parents, I wonder whether we need to work on our own barrel of crap in order for us to be available to love our children in a free and open way. It is indeed very hard to see the beauty of the little being standing before us if we are looking through a lens of self-loathing or hatred or regret or fear.

My dear mum couldn’t love me freely, just as I was, as she couldn’t love herself, just as she was. Her body was ravaged by 40 years of ill-health, her dreams slashed because she was a woman growing up in an era where women were not encouraged to do much other than iron and cook and she carried many unresolved family traumas in the very cells of her miraculous body. She was angry with the way her life had turned out, those molecules of anger flooded her body and her heart and she simply slipped into survival mode. None of this was her fault, she did not know she had a choice – until it was too late and the cancer won.

This is the gift of mindfulness, it can give us a choice. It can help us to fall awake and see what is actually happening, rather than being trapped by the stories or opinions or beliefs we may have inherited or simply picked up along the way.

 So, for me now the question isn’t “how can I fix my children” the question is “how can I love and accept myself enough so that I can see the magic of the child before me?”. This question is not always easy to answer as we are so very habituated at getting in our own way and having our natural ability of clear seeing attention hijacked by our stories, but I think it is one that is worth asking over and over again.

Coming Home to Myself

WHILE MEDITATION CAN OFFER US CLARITY AND CALM, CONNECTION IS ITS GREATEST GIFT

 Let’s be honest. Most of us start meditating to fix ourselves – in some way.

 To fix our stress, our sleeplessness, our over-eating, over-spending. To perhaps fill that hole in the pit of our stomach that yells at us “you are not enough, you need to do more”.

When we approach our meditation this way, it becomes just another thing on our endless “to do” list. Another thing we “should” do to live well and be happy. What if we changed this? What if we looked at meditation as an opportunity to nourish ourselves? As a gift to ourselves (and the world). As an opportunity to find out what we are really about and then to live from a place of greater compassion and wisdom……..

 As I have written and spoken about before, I was a resentful meditator. It was just another thing I felt I should be doing and another thing I could beat myself up about for not doing. I was simply bringing the same approach to meditation as the one I had been practicing all my life. Work hard. Don’t give up. Do it properly. Achieve and ultimately, win. I fell in love with mindfulness as a technique because it offered me the possibility that actually, I didn’t need to fix anything, do anything, achieve anything.

However, over the years of teaching and yes, “selling” this technique, I have noticed the promises I have made my students and clients. Yes, your concentration and productivity will likely improve (clarity) and yes, your stress levels will likely reduce, and your sleep will improve (calm). These are clearly great benefits and we all need more of these in our modern life of 24/7 stimulation. To be honest though, for me, the greatest gift of mindfulness and meditation, has been a sense of befriending myself, a sense of coming home (this, my friends, is connection).

 Before I started on this journey, I wasn’t even aware of my internal critic – she had always been there, spewing a constant barrage of orders. Setting goals and demanding achievements – to demonstrate my worth to myself and the world. It was only when I sat down and started to watch the activity of my mind that I was able to notice her, my very own drill sergeant.

Now, don’t get me wrong, this drill sergeant of mine has been incredibly helpful. She has pushed me to work hard when I wanted to give up. As an adolescent, she stood by my bed at 5am encouraging me to get up for swimming training, reminding me that I needed to beat my arch enemies – Penny and Lauren. As a young adult studying psychology, it was probably her that got me through the statistics at university. As a new mother, she was the one demanding I get up for the 400th time in one night. The thing is however, her constant commands about having to do and be more, caused me to leave myself, over and over again. I believed that joy and peace and happiness and perfection could not possibly be residing within me. I had to go out and search for it in other places – in jobs or clothes or friends or food. I left myself and my own heart over and over and over again. As a result, I had nowhere to belong and nowhere to rest.

“Stop walking through the world looking for confirmation that you don't belong. You will always find it because you've made that your mission. Stop scouring people's faces for evidence that you're not enough. You will always find it because you've made that your goal. True belonging and self-worth are not goods; we don't negotiate their value with the world. The truth about who we are lives in our hearts. Our call to courage is to protect our wild heart against constant evaluation, especially our own. No one belongs here more than you.”

Brene Brown – Braving the Wilderness

Mindfulness and meditation continue to help me to come back home, back to my true self, back to my heart. I am reminded to connect to something greater than my internal drill sergeant (she is still there but just doesn’t drive the bus as much as she used to!) and to value myself as a perfectly imperfect human. For me, this is indeed a daily practice and one I now enjoy and look forward to.

So, if you are looking to start or deepen your own meditation and mindfulness practice, pay attention to your attitude, pay attention to your expectations and pay attention to the promises the teacher makes. The clarity and the calm may arrive and hallelujah for those, but it is the connection that we can never unlearn or un-feel, it is the coming home that we will carry with us forever.