Welcoming Summer with Reflections

Summer is here… 

Let's take a moment to think about the last season, Spring.

What did you "plant"? What seeds did you plant in the Spring that need to be nurtured, watered and protected during the Summer season?

Maybe it was beginning treatments at HDH, maybe it was removing a habit (smoking, over eating), maybe it was being in a place of curiosity?

Think about this for a minute, taking a moment to pause and think about where you were in March, what were you doing? How is life different now? How are you different now? Taking these pauses for contemplation, integration and solidifying learnings is vital to making consistent progress.

Without judgement of self or others, what did the last season teach you about life? Yourself? Others? The world? Write them down. If you don't have a journal, use your phone in the notes section or get some paper, either way let's write down these thoughts, feelings and insights.

Now, a new season is upon us, Summer! The season of long days and nights, heat, water, fun! Gardening, camping, vacations, whatever this looks like for you.

Let's think about the three months ahead, and set an intention for this season. Remember: a great intention and goal (similar but different) is maintenance. Often it's just continuing doing things that are working, consistently and over time that creates the lasting change. Sometimes it's seeing that you completed something and it's time for something new. Either way, think about the past three months and the three months ahead. What will this season be about for you?

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Group Integration Therapy is awesome! Please come if you can. Here's some notes from one of our group sessions this month. We are doing a deep dive on anxiety and some tools/suggestions on how to navigate it better:

"Fear Fantasies aka Anxieties"

The "fork in the road" filter "is this a real threat I am responding to (poisonous spider, rattlesnake, car coming at you) or is this a fantasy of fear"?

The fantasies of fear often have a job, write down your fantasy of fear (future) and then think about what its job must be (protection, to make you feel, fortune telling) then write that down, get curious, these swirling fear fantasies can be really elaborate, detailed and remember you are creating your own horror film and sadly you know what you're most afraid of so this works every time.

So you are orchestrating this horror film where you are the star character and damn they have bad luck, in your fantasies nothing ever works out for them, in fact it's always the worst of the worst case scenarios. This is where you catch yourself, include some banter with your inner dialogue like "silly girl, you're doing that fear fantasy thing again, you must be avoiding the laundry", celebrate and laugh about how creative you are.

Then start to contemplate the other two anxiety busters…

What's the best case scenario? Do your best to get creative, elaborate and detailed on this one.

Next, the most likely. So what actually happens tends to be a combination of the best and the worst and other random shit you couldn't even imagine happening, so fantasize about that too. Write it all down; remember journaling is the best therapeutic tool. Often overlooked and under utilized but still tried and true.

Start noticing the roles you give the actors in your fantasy fear film, who's the villain? The victim? The rescuer? The hero?

Isn't that interesting. For you to get the worst outcome every time, everyone must play their role perfectly, otherwise it could be ruined. All of that hard work making up scenarios, suffering and feeling all of the emotions of that scenario playing out, for nothing!

What if instead, you took a brisk walk? Lifted some heavy weights? Listened to a podcast, book or music you can sing along to? Slow your breathing and smile.

Give your imagination a high five for creativity, detail, getting weird and move on.

Don't forget about the "letting go" - you're not actually holding on. What's gone is already gone, you have a bad habit of clinging to a cloud, grasping at air and acting as if it is solid. Release the habit of creating suffering. Life is painful enough, why work so hard to make it worse?

Much love!

So proud of you all, 

Christine Salvo