{"id":1047,"date":"2020-04-30T02:00:09","date_gmt":"2020-04-30T07:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/?p=1047"},"modified":"2020-07-01T16:09:39","modified_gmt":"2020-07-01T21:09:39","slug":"bearing-our-souls-a-crash-course-in-soothing-the-overwhelming-emotions-of-a-pandemic-part-3-name-it-to-tame-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/2020\/04\/bearing-our-souls-a-crash-course-in-soothing-the-overwhelming-emotions-of-a-pandemic-part-3-name-it-to-tame-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Bearing Our Souls: A Crash Course in Soothing the Overwhelming Emotions of a Pandemic \u2013 Part 3\u200a \u2013 \u201cName It to Tame It\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">To listen to an audio reading of this post, <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\"click here (opens in a new tab)\" href=\"https:\/\/bit.ly\/SoulsPart3Audio\" target=\"_blank\">click here<\/a> or go to <a href=\"https:\/\/bit.ly\/SoulsPart3Audio\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\"bit.ly\/SoulsPart3Audio (opens in a new tab)\">bit.ly\/SoulsPart3Audio<\/a><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote has-text-align-center is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p><em>At a moment of intensity, <\/em><\/p><p><em>a failure to be understood, <\/em><\/p><p><em>to be connected with emotionally, <\/em><\/p><p><em>can result in a profound feeling of shame. <\/em><\/p><p><em>The shame generated by <\/em><\/p><p><em>missed opportunities for the alignment of states<\/em><\/p><p><em>\u2014for the feeling of emotional resonance, of \u201cfeeling felt\u201d\u2014<\/em><\/p><p><em>can lead to withdrawal. <\/em><\/p><p><em>Even with less intense states, <\/em><\/p><p><em>not being understood may lead to a sense of isolation. <\/em><\/p><p><em>\u2014 Daniel Siegel, The Developing Mind, Second Edition<\/em><\/p><p>***<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>Last week, in the evening\nafter writing all day, I broke down into wracking sobs. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Digression: If you\u2019ve been reading this series,\nyou\u2019ll see that I\u2019ve been crying a lot these days. I hope you can also see that\nthe tears are for subtly different reasons every week. That\u2019s part of the point\nof this article\u2014coming to understand the specificity of your emotions will\neventually help you to feel better. Stay tuned.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As I was saying\u2026 Last week\nI curled up on my living room sofa in a sobbing ball at the end of my writing\nday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>My whole body was aching\nbecause I felt torn in two: <\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>One huge part\nof me loves writing about emotions and feels a social obligation to write to\nhelp others manage their big emotions during this pandemic, and writing requires\na huge expenditure of energy right now.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Another equally\nenormous part of me feels constantly exhausted and full of grief in the midst\nof all this isolation and uncertainty, and that part just wants to curl up in a\ncorner and rest.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>The contentious pull back\nand forth between those two parts of me was almost physically painful and left\nme feeling an emotion I can only name as anguish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>My husband looked at me\nwith understanding eyes when I said, \u201cI just can\u2019t do it. I can\u2019t keep up with\nthe writing when I\u2019m so emotional and all I want to do is lie around and rest.\u201d\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He said, \u201cYou don\u2019t have\nto. No one will blame you if you take a break.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I broke down into sobs of\nrelief. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As <em>these<\/em> tears poured through me, I sensed that there were way more\ntears here than what the current situation warranted. They were related, yes, but\nthey were extra large.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Allowing the tears to flow,\ncurious about what they might mean, memories flooded into my mind. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Memories of the months\nafter my husband died suddenly when my son was a baby almost 30 years ago.\nMemories of feeling so devastated, so grief-stricken that I could hardly move\nand I didn\u2019t care if I lived or died. Memories of waking up each morning to a\nbaby boy whose life depended on me and for whom I was determined to rise to the\noccasion in the midst of my grief to provide as joyful and normal of a\nchildhood as was possible under the circumstances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>That was the <strong>ultimate<\/strong>\nfeeling of being torn in two. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Day after day after day, a\nstrong life force pulled me down into bottomless grief where I <em>needed<\/em> to lie around, cry, and rest;\neven as an opposite, equally strong life force forced me out into the world to\nsmile at my son\u2019s antics, take him to the park, and cook nutritious food even\nwhen I felt nauseous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The pain of that\nsimultaneous both\/and was unimaginable. I cry a bit every time I allow myself\nto think about it even now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What I realized last week\nas the tears rolled through my body, was that the present-day torn-in-two feeling\u2014of\n<em>needing<\/em> to write even while <em>needing<\/em> to not give a s*** about\nanything\u2014was tapping into my old wound, pulling up emotions and tears on behalf\nof a traumatic past experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Once I made the connection,\nI felt all the grief at once: Profound grief for the trauma my self endured 30\nyears ago when she made such an incredible sacrifice to go down and through her\nawful grief even while she fully engaged in parenting. Accurately-sized grief\nabout the current push\/pull inside myself about the writing. Grief for the\nworld situation that was causing me to feel sluggish and unable to write. All\nof it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When the tears gave way to gasps\nand then to deep breaths, the storm had passed. For the first time in days, the\ntension I\u2019d carried in my neck was gone; the clenching in my stomach was\nreleased; and I was ready to cook dinner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A blend of receiving\ncompassion from myself and from my husband, along with clearly naming and\nexpressing my emotions led me to relief. I still felt some torn-ness about\nwhether I wanted to continue writing or take a break from it, but the emotions\nfelt manageable, useful even. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In fact, separating the\npast and present and feeling it all, allowed me to use the accurate present-day\ntorn-in-two feeling to discern what I needed to do with the rest of my week: I\ngave myself lots of time to lie around resting, crying or distracting all weekend.\nGiving in to that need led me to today\u2019s natural energy that allowed me to feel\nlike writing. A nice both\/and that included the needs of each part of myself generated\ntrue gratitude that what I\u2019m dealing with today is not nearly as painful as the\nloss I experienced all those years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>***<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This example reveals what\nannoys me about the popular mental health articles that recommend mindfulness, exercise, staying\nconnected, controlling what you can, gratitude practice, etc.:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>They jump to soothing and distracting practices<\/em> <em>without naming or\ntending to the feelings that are causing you to need soothing or distraction! <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And the articles that\ndo suggest names for emotions, like grief, don\u2019t acknowledge that grief can be\nfor more than one thing at a time and can be complex and interwoven with lots\nof events from the past and the present. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I want to help you learn how to calm and soothe yourself and\n<em>then<\/em> discern whether you need to\nexpress your emotions or distract from them. Distraction can be exactly what\u2019s\ncalled for, but it only truly works if you acknowledge that it\u2019s what your\nemotional state actually calls for in the current moment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>***<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Name It (With Kindness) to Tame It<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.drdansiegel.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\"Daniel Siegel, the founder of Interpersonal Neurobiology, (opens in a new tab)\">Daniel Siegel, the founder of Interpersonal Neurobiology,<\/a> and the author of countless books about the mind, parenting, and therapy, coined the easy-to-remember phrase \u201cName It to Tame It\u201d for working with emotions because he understands and teaches about how the human brain works. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He describes how your brain\nis made up of a higher part (the cortex) and a lower part (the subcortical\nbrain, made up of the limbic system and the brain stem). Your higher brain is\nresponsible for observing and making sense of things; your lower brain is\nresponsible for emotion, motivation, fight\/flight\/freeze, and your arousal\nstates. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When you\u2019re agitated,\nafraid, or awash in intense emotions, your right amygdala (a part of your lower\nbrain) is highly active and irritated. It\u2019s like that lower right brain is on\nfire with pain, and that particular pain is what causes you to feel overwhelmed,\nanxious, distressed, or any other agitated state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What your dear, distressed\nright amygdala needs in order to be truly calmed is to <em>feel felt.<\/em> (Another delightful Siegel term.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cFeeling felt\u201d is a product\nof feeling both emotionally connected and deeply understood, in that order. Let\nme show you how to help yourself feel felt, and therefore comforted and\nsoothed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong><em>1) Emotional Connection \u2013 Observe With\nCompassion<\/em><\/strong><em><\/em><\/h4>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote has-text-align-center is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p><em>Strong emotions require compassion to feel safe or soothed. <\/em><\/p><p><em>\u2014 Janina Fisher<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>The emotional connection\nI\u2019m talking about here emerges from being observed with compassion. The purpose\nof this emotional connection is to help you feel <em>not alone<\/em>. Frightening situations or overwhelming emotions are\ndifficult but not impossible to manage with help, but can feel unbearable if\nyou sense you\u2019re all alone. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>(Of course it feels better\nto have another person offer you this sense of connection and compassion, so if\nyou have a loved one or a therapist who can help you with these big emotions,\nthat\u2019s fantastic. Yet the good news is that it\u2019s possible to offer this kind of\nhelp and understanding to <em>yourself<\/em>,\nif you know how. Hence this series of articles!)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What helps your brain (and\ntherefore you) feel not alone is a sense of <em>presence<\/em>\noffered from your high-brain self to your low-brain self and\/or from someone\nelse to your low-brain self. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Presence in this context is\nabout making a <em>compassionate connection<\/em>\nwith your lower right brain. Physical touch, empathic facial expressions, a\nnurturing voice, and nonjudgmental listening all contribute to a sense of\npresence\u2014all of which you can offer to yourself, even if it\u2019s only from images\ninside your own head and body.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That is, you use your\nhigher brain to engage with your lower brain with kindness and connection\ninstead of with logic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Like this: <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cAh, it looks like you\u2019re\nhaving a hard time. There\u2019s so much scary stuff going on in the world, and it\u2019s\naffecting you deeply. I can see why you\u2019d be upset. Let\u2019s see if I can help you\nfeel better.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Not this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cYou don\u2019t need to be so\nupset. You just missed a trip; you didn\u2019t lose your job.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Nor this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThere\u2019s no reason for you\nto be so tired. You don\u2019t even have to drive to work any more.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>However,\nyou <em>can <\/em>facilitate this state of presence\nby using gentle logic with your higher brain in the service of helping your\ncortex understand that your big and crazy-looking feelings do make sense and do\ndeserve comfort and expression. That\u2019s what Part 1 of this series was for. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Take a look at <em><a href=\"https:\/\/bit.ly\/SoulsPart1Text\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\"Bearing Our Souls: A Crash Course in Soothing the Overwhelming Emotions of a Pandemic \u2013 Part 1 \u2014Stories Matter (opens in a new tab)\">Bearing Our Souls: A Crash Course in Soothing the Overwhelming Emotions of a Pandemic \u2013 Part 1 \u2014Stories Matter<\/a><\/em> for details about how to bring yourself into a state of compassionate presence toward yourself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This self-observation from\na state of compassionate presence helps your lower brain know that you are not\nalone. Feeling met and not alone begins to calm and soothe your lower brain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You will still feel big\nfeelings, but you will feel less tensed up and less frightened of the emotions.\nFeeling all stirred up, anxious, or shut down will give way to flowing emotions\nand body states that begin to move. You might feel shaky.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now you\u2019re ready for the\nnext step.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong><em>2) Feeling Understood \u2013 Get Curious\nand Name It to Tame It<\/em><\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote has-text-align-center is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p><em>Generous listening is powered by curiosity, <\/em><\/p><p><em>a virtue we can invite and nurture in ourselves <\/em><\/p><p><em>to render it instinctive. <\/em><\/p><p><em>It involves a kind of vulnerability\u2014<\/em><\/p><p><em>a willingness to be surprised, <\/em><\/p><p><em>to let go of assumptions and take in ambiguity. <\/em><\/p><p><em>\u2014 Krista Tippett<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>Once you\u2019ve turned toward\nyourself with kindness and presence and your system begins to loosen, it\u2019s time\nto become gently curious about <em>what,<\/em>\nspecifically, you\u2019re feeling. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><em>That\u2019s because when you accurately\n(and kindly) name the emotion you\u2019re feeling, your brain squirts soothing\nneurotransmitters into the right lower brain and calms it!<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That\u2019s right!\nCompassionately putting words to the specific emotion you\u2019re feeling further\ncalms your lower brain and begins the process of making sense of the emotion. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Making sense of the emotion\nhelps you discern what actions, emotional expressions, or distractions will\ntruly help you move through your feelings, or to bear your emotional state if your\nit\u2019s ongoing. (Like continual feelings of fear of uncertainty in the context of\nthe pandemic.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You might not know right\naway <em>what<\/em> your particular emotion is\nin the moment, but the right brain wants to be known. So if you approach\nyourself with mindful, soft curiosity, gently wondering what the feeling might\nbe, many times your right brain will spontaneously offer it up to you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For example, when I was\ncrying so hard about my present day torn-in-two feeling and I became aware that\nthe tears seemed out of proportion to the current day\u2019s emotion, I didn\u2019t say\nto myself, \u201cSheesh! You\u2019re making such a big deal out of this! It\u2019s hard, but it\u2019s\nnot <em>that<\/em> hard. Why don\u2019t you calm\ndown?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What I did think to myself\nwas something like, \u201cWow! These tears are <em>so<\/em>\nbig! They\u2019re coming from the core of my being. It feels like there\u2019s something\ndeeper there that\u2019s being tugged at by my feelings about the writing. I wonder\nwhat that could be?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As soon as I turned toward\nthat feeling with gentle curiosity, the memories of my gigantic ancient feeling\nflooded into my mind and the sensation of YES! THAT\u2019S IT! allowed me to fully\nrelax into the expression of that emotion. Then that round of grief moved\nthrough me and I felt relieved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So once you\u2019ve brought your\nhigher brain into a state of compassionate presence and your low brain starts\nto loosen your system, begin to simply offer yourself kind curiosity. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You don\u2019t have to actually\ntalk to yourself. An inner state that simply conveys, \u201cHmmm. I wonder what this\nfeeling is, and what it\u2019s actually about? I\u2019m interested,\u201d is all that\u2019s\nneeded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Keep in mind that these\nemotions can be all over the map\u2014grief, anger, fear, disappointment,\nuncertainty, anguish, disillusionment, and more. Be willing to let go of\nassumptions and allow yourself to be surprised.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To help you identify and\nwork with your specific emotions, Part 4 of this series will explore the\ndifferent specific feelings that might arise in the context of an enormously distressing\nsituation like the pandemic we\u2019re living through. Part 5 will offer ideas of\nhow to work with, express, soothe, and helpfully distract from the emotions you\ndiscover.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the meantime, you can\nhelp yourself by starting to make a list of emotions you\u2019re familiar with. Be\nopen to nuances of emotion, too. Disappointed, sad, raw, nostalgic, pensive,\nand anguished are examples of different nuances of similar emotions. Even this\nopenness and curiosity about emotions will help your lower right brain to\nunderstand that you really are interested in how it feels, so emotion words\nmight start popping up out of nowhere to be placed on your list.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then, when you turn toward\nyour emotional state with curiosity, you\u2019ll be primed and open to discern what\nthe specific emotion you\u2019re feeling actually is. You\u2019ll learn to name the\nemotion accurately and get that YES! THAT\u2019S IT burst of soothing neurotransmitters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>You\u2019ll begin to be able to <em>name it to tame it!<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Keep in mind that you can\noffer your partner, your child, your friends this same kind of presence and\ncuriosity, too, and that\u2019s a good thing because we\u2019re all in this together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>When we feel felt, we are not alone. What is shareable becomes bearable. \u2014 Daniel Siegel<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/bit.ly\/BearingSouls4Text\" target=\"_blank\" aria-label=\"Click here to read Part 4 (opens in a new tab)\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" class=\"aioseop-link\">Click here to read Part 4<\/a> of this series, where I&#8217;ll explore the details of what, exactly, you might be feeling during this time, in order to facilitate your ability to &#8220;name it to tame it.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong><em>Let me know what emotions you discover\nas you offer yourself presence and curiosity. And let me know if that helps\u2026<\/em><\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>To listen to an audio reading of this post, click here or go to bit.ly\/SoulsPart3Audio At a moment of intensity, a failure to be understood, to be connected with emotionally, can result in a profound feeling of shame. The shame generated by missed opportunities for the alignment of states \u2014for the feeling of emotional resonance, of \u201cfeeling felt\u201d\u2014 can lead to withdrawal. Even with less intense states, not being understood may lead to a sense of isolation. \u2014 Daniel Siegel, The Developing Mind, Second Edition *** Last week, in the evening after writing all day, I broke down into wracking [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1048,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[69,57,62,52,25],"class_list":["post-1047","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-covid-19","tag-emotion-regulation","tag-emotional-expression","tag-emotions","tag-grief"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1047","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1047"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1047\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1106,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1047\/revisions\/1106"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1048"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deepcenterforgrowth.com\/candyce-counseling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}