Conscious Escapism: The Benefits of a Spiritual Cheat Day

“The road to excess leads to the palace of wisdom… You never know what is enough until you know what is more than enough.” ~William Blake

Many people discover spirituality through suffering. I found the path due to years of depression, anxiety, and psychosis. Part of the awakening process is identifying behaviors, traits, habits, or thoughts that don’t serve you. As your behavior changes, so does your diet. Not just what you eat, but everything you consume, including what you listen to, watch, read, and pay attention to.

Orthorexia is the term given to an unhealthy focus on eating in a healthy way. This sounds like a paradox, as a healthy diet improves overall health. However, there’s a tipping point—eating well can become an obsession. You might develop anxiety around eating junk food, and your desire to eat well influences your social life, or you feel guilty for the times you indulge.

Your spiritual diet isn’t free from its own form of orthorexia. A healthy spiritual diet—such as a practice of meditation, reading spiritual texts, spending time in nature, serving others—boosts your spiritual health. But there is a tipping point.

What if you guilt yourself for wanting to spend an evening watching Netflix? Or eating without being mindful? Or being distracted and unfocused? Or not having the energy to serve? Or not catching yourself before reacting in anger?

What if when you feel anxiety, you don’t want to journal or meditate or unpick and dissect its root cause? What if you don’t want to spend the energy to “raise your vibration” or reframe your thoughts? What if all you want is to eat ice cream or go out with friends or have a glass of wine or watch the Champions League?

The time will come where you no longer crave junk food, for the nourishment of the path itself satiates you more than anything. Until this point, rather than trying too hard to resist, it’s much more beneficial to allow yourself to indulge, and give yourself the occasional treat, without guilt or shame.

Unconscious Escapism vs. Conscious Escapism

In psychology, escapism is defined as a behavior or desire to avoid confronting reality. I place escapism into two categories: unconscious and conscious. This is an important distinction, because most people who practice meditation and mindfulness are, to some degree, aware of when they are engaging in unhelpful behavior.

Unconscious escapism lacks self-awareness. It is a default, auto-pilot reaction to certain uncomfortable feelings. It’s not wrong, or bad, it’s just a way we learn how to cope. But in the context of spiritual growth and healing, unconscious escapism perpetuates suffering. It distracts us from discomfort and ultimately distracts us from ourselves.

However, conscious escapism explores and acknowledges underlying emotions with compassion, before choosing to indulge. Maybe you’re just tired or require a feeling of comfort, or simply want to enjoy a movie. All of these options are okay, and don’t make you any less “spiritual.” Quite the opposite: choosing to do a mindless activity can be a great act of self-compassion.

Conscious Escapism Is the Cheat Meal

Conscious escapism is choosing conventional distractions, knowing the occasional cheat meal doesn’t reflect your overall diet. It’s acknowledging where you’re at and allowing yourself to lean on mechanisms behaviors that provide temporary solace, fully aware this isn’t the ideal solution.

To get physically fit, a manageable and balanced routine and diet are better than an extreme, high-intensity routine and crash diet. Start off with high intensity, you’ll likely burn out and return to old habits. Instead, as you progress and form new habits, you might increase the intensity, or find that eating well becomes easier.

There’s no reason the spiritual path has to be any different. Over the years, I’ve experienced the extremes of depriving myself due to the belief around a spiritual person wouldn’t… (get angry, eat nachos or other unhealthy food, binge watch Netflix when feeling down, argue with their partner, enjoy buying new clothes, curse, procrastinate on tackling their finances…)

It’s only when I allowed conscious escapism that I’ve discovered what really benefits me.

Mostly, I was encouraged to try this route by supportive friends and family who could tell I needed time off. I’ve always pushed myself, I’ve always placed high standards on myself, and these traits of perfectionism were absorbed into my spiritual practice.

Over time my need for conventional escape has reduced. But that doesn’t mean I won’t skip a meditation session or watch a few episodes of Community to lighten my mood if it feels right to do so. Going too far in the other direction creates a feeling of stress or even resentment towards my practice, a result of spiritual orthorexia.

The Spiritual Diet and Discernment

A word of warning: Conscious escapism isn’t an excuse to choose the path of least resistance. The ego can hijack this concept, too, weaving a narrative of deceit that finds excuses and reasons as to why you deserve to not meditate, or why your unique spiritual path is finding enlightenment through Game of Thrones.

Be cautious of this and apply the principle of a standard diet. Understand which foods are good and which aren’t. I know that a healthy diet requires me to eat well most of the time. I know that if I always indulge in high-fat, high-sugar junk food, it’ll lead to reduced health. But I know the occasional treat is fine.

Knowing when to indulge and when to do the work is a matter of trial and error. It takes time, practice, and self-honesty. It requires self-compassion for the moments you over-indulge, knowing sometimes the road to excess leads to the palace of wisdom.

When you find momentum with your practice, you might experience a tendency to go all-in. The joy and inspiration that comes from meditation, or spiritual discussions, or insights, or noticing areas of growth or healing, create a sense of wanting more. You might feel the spiritual path is your life’s calling, and you’ll do all you can to honor it.

This is beautiful, and it’s worth appreciating the innocence of this intrinsic motivation. However, I’m here to tell you—you can take the day off. You can breathe, pause, and take time away from growth or development.

You can, unashamedly, give yourself permission to indulge in conscious escapism.

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About Ricky Derisz

Ricky Derisz is the founder of MindThatEgo.com. Join his newsletter for a free copy of Mindsets for Mindfulness, a practical guide to navigating the ego on the spiritual path. He’s the instructor of The Superpower of Self-Compassion, an affordable online course with video lectures, meditations, and exercises. More content on YouTube, Facebook, and the MindThatEgo Podcast.

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The Joy and Power of Realizing I Am More Than My Job

“Authenticity is a collection of choices that we have to make every day. It’s about the choice to show up and be real. The choice to be honest. The choice to let our true selves be seen.” ~Brene Brown

“What do you want to be when you grow up?”

“It’s so nice to meet you. What do you do?”

These are the questions we are asked our entire life. When we’re children, everyone always asks about the future. They excitedly ask, “What will you do?” The subtext of this questions is:

“How will you be productive in society? How will you contribute?”

Being asked those questions all the time as children turned us into the adults that ask them. We are in the same cycle and do not seem to know to ask instead, “Who are you?”

For a long time, my focus and self-identity was tied up in what I did. I would tell people, “I am a filmmaker.” When I was young, I knew I wanted to make films. I loved to tell stories. “I want to be a movie director!”

When I grew up and actually got jobs in Hollywood, I realized that most people are not movie directors. Most people are not even filmmakers. They work in film. It takes many people to make one, but only a handful of people get any recognition or able to consider themselves filmmakers.

“What do you do?” people would ask. I would struggle to figure out how to explain that I was a production assistant who worked on films. I was basically a glorified secretary, a personal assistant. But I was not a filmmaker.

I worked on other filmmaker’s films. I personally had not made any art or films for over six years. I was so busy and tired of trying to work in the industry I wanted to work in that I forgot about myself.

When I could no longer define myself as a filmmaker, I became disillusioned. If I wasn’t one, then what was I? People always got excited when I said I worked on movies. Their eyes would light up, and they would pester me with questions about the famous people I knew or inside secrets.

They never wanted to know how much sleep I missed or how many friends and family events I sacrificed for the bragging rights of Hollywood. They didn’t want to know what excited me about life or who I was. They only wanted to know “what I did.”

This discontentment grew. I became angrier and angrier at the film industry as a whole. I felt used. Worthless. The world was nothing but egos and money. I would never be them unless I sold myself and played their game.

I wasn’t willing to play the game, find the back doors, penny pinch, or be downright cruel. I was beginning to see that the industry was soulless. The art and stories were being dictated by companies that wanted to earn as much as possible.

The stories were not chosen for their value and need in the world, but by which would make the most money. They profited on these stories and off the handwork and sacrifices of the below-the-line workers that were seen as disposable.

Celebrities made millions, and I made minimum wage, but I didn’t have the luxury of a free jet ride back home and an apartment for my girlfriend. I was reprimanded for refusing to work on a Saturday after only five hours off.

Slowly, I began to question if this was who I was. If this “works in the film industry” was really. me. And I felt guilty! I felt like I was being ungrateful. I was working on big movies! How could I not be happy? I had “made it.”

I could only go up from here. I could get to be the next Stephen Spielberg, the next Tarantino, the next Lucas? Then I worked for one of these types of famous guys. He was just a human. He wasn’t the god I held him up to be. He was flawed.

Sure, he got the adrenaline rush of making art, but at my expense. I was lucky to have my name in the credits. I wasn’t part of the golden ones, the actors and producers who were the “real” movie.

If I didn’t want to play the “Hollywood” game I could go independent. But I felt guilty that I called myself a filmmaker when I hadn’t made a film in years! I didn’t even have any desire to even come up with one.

I had friends who were making films on the weekends. They dedicated every free second to it. All I did was sleep. Then drag myself for dinner or a date and pretend I had a social life before I had to be back at work. I felt guilty and afraid that if left the industry I would be seen as a failure.

I was afraid that I would be seen as weak or people would think that I couldn’t hack it. The more angst I felt, the more I turned to my unhelpful habit of Googling advice.  There is nothing helpful about hours of reddit and self-help blogs. They are all contradictory.

This Googling, however, led to some articles with actual facts. This is when I started to read about Americans’ tendency to identify with our jobs. Our self-worth and identity are wrapped up in what we do.

We say things like, “I am a lawyer.” “I am a physicist.” “I am a teacher.” We don’t say, “I practice law.” “I study physics. “I teach.” We put the emphasis on the job and not the I.

I started the long, tedious process of separating myself, the me, from the filmmaker and the woman who worked in film. I realized that I was uncomfortable calling myself a filmmaker because I wasn’t one.

I struggled to define my title to other because I didn’t really believe that it was who I was. I am a woman who enjoys movies and stories. More importantly, I am energized by stories.

Filmmaking was just a job. The intense zealotry aspect of the film industry had always sat wrong with me. Now I know why. I am not a job. I am more than the work I do.

Through this process I came to slowly accept that I wasn’t happy with the work I was doing. There was a disconnect between it and the way I saw myself in life. I needed to walk away for a bit and allow myself to heal from the harm I and the toxic industry had infected upon my soul.

It is not just the film industry that is toxic. American work culture is. We have created an environment where work has to be our passion. Confucius said, “Choose a job you love, and you’ll never have to work a day in your life.” I disagree. Work is work.

You might enjoy it, but as long as you are giving your time for money you are participating in a business transaction, and it is work. Just accept it as work and accept that you can be a whole person outside of your job. Your job is only a small sliver of the much larger person.

Our work culture throws around the phrase “We are like a family.” It is encouraged and suggested that your team members and colleagues are family. They aren’t.

You can get along with them, be friends with them, but by labeling them as family there is a pressure to feel loyal and not let them down. Our alliances are manipulated to be given first and foremost to work. Any time spend doing something for yourself or your actual family is seen as selfish.

A year after my last film job I still struggle to see myself outside these identities. I am now enrolled in grad school and I want to label myself as a student. But I am not. I am Dia. I study mythology.

Sometimes I am a storyteller, but that title does not and cannot encompass the whole and vastness that I am as a person.

Identifying ourselves by our work is like trying to fill a mug with the ocean. At some point the ocean will overpower the mug, and we will be left wet and feeling bad about ourselves.

The next time you are at a party, after the pandemic, and you meet someone new, maybe don’t ask, “What do you do?” Instead ask, “Who are you?” Create the space to meet the real, whole person; the person who is vast, deep, and full of wonder for the world.

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About Dia Griffiths

Dia Griffiths grew up in the mountains of West Virginia. To this day, even though she lives in Brooklyn with her cat Coco, Dia is inspired by the hollows of the forests. She loves stories and mythology and finds power in them. Dia is currently in enrolled at Pacifica Graduate Institute to study mythology. Dia is working at creating spaces and communities for people to connect, heal and authentically be through storytelling.

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Creative Meditation? This Art Subscription Box Incorporates Mindfulness

Get into the feel-good flow of creating with the new and improved Master Peace Box, now only $39.

Anyone who knows me knows I’m passionate about creating. For me, it’s a form of therapy. It’s a chance to get out of my head and into a state of flow, freeing myself from my obsessive thoughts while pouring all my feelings onto the page, or the canvas, or even the pot. (Though to be fair, not often the pot. I’m a horrible, infrequent cook!)

Creativity is healing, energizing, and rejuvenating, and it’s also a fun, easy way to be mindful—to be fully immersed in the present moment, free from pressures, worries, and regrets.

It also enables you to create something you can feel proud of. It doesn’t have to be perfect or professional; regardless of what you make, it’s yours. Your heart. Your soul. Your vision. A piece of you, and all your complex beauty. And there’s something empowering about that.

If you also appreciate the healing benefits of art and enjoy accessing the feel-good state creativity evokes, I think you’ll love the Master Peace Box!

What Is the Master Peace Box?

This art subscription box sends a monthly art supply kit that pairs with a guided virtual workshop. The classes incorporate meditation, helping you foster mindfulness through creativity every month, on your own or as a fun date night activity.

You’ll receive everything you need to craft something beautiful, with expert guidance from professional artists over Zoom.

Each month, you’ll explore a new artistic and healing experience.

This month, the Master Peace Box takes on watercolors and sound healing. You’ll get into a relaxing, soothing flow state with a sound healing practice, led by Susy Shieffelin, founder of The Copper Vessel and sound healing training guide. Then, you’ll dive into the painting lesson, creating a watercolor piece with The Whimsical Creative.

The event goes live on March 28^th, at 10am PST, but if you can’t make the live Zoom workshop, no worries! You’ll have three weeks to access a recording of the event, so you can find the perfect time to unwind and enjoy a little relaxation and imagination.

Create More, Stress Less (in 3 Easy Steps)

Want to give the Master Peace Box a try?

1. Get the Box.

After you sign up here, you’ll receive a box full of art supplies for the paired virtual workshop.

2. Join the Workshop.

Get access to live art classes from professional and renowned artists. If quarantine has made life feel a little grey, this is a great way to add some color!

3. Feel Good.

The Master Peace Box team holds space for you and your creative journey. Who knew feeling good was so easy? Art knew. Art knew all along.

The Master Peace Box was created by life coach Michael Gallagher. His intention was to share the practices that helped him heal—meditation and self-expression—in one easy and approachable setting.

To dive deeper into the worlds of creativity and spirituality, follow him on Clubhouse @masterpeacebox.

—

Maybe you’re like me and you relish the opportunity to express yourself while feeling free and childlike, or maybe you’re new to art but love the idea of feeling alive, excited, and inspired. Either way, the Master Peace Box can take you on a journey to calm and creative bliss. I hope you enjoy the sound healing and workshop—and I’d love to see your painting if you want to email it to me after the event!

**Though this is a sponsored post, you can trust I only promote products I love and can easily personally recommend!

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About Lori Deschene

Lori Deschene is the founder of Tiny Buddha. She’s also the author of Tiny Buddha’s Gratitude Journal and other books and co-founder of Recreate Your Life Story, an online course that helps you let go of the past and live a life you love. She recently launched a Mindfulness Kit to help reduce our stress and increase our peace and joy. For daily wisdom, join the Tiny Buddha list here. You can also follow Tiny Buddha on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

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Why Curiosity Is My Love Language and How It Makes Me Feel Seen

“Being heard is so close to being loved that for the average person, they are almost indistinguishable.” ⁠~David W. Augsburger

The five love languages—a framework for how we give and receive affection created by psychologist Gary Chapman in 1992⁠—include quality time, gifts, acts of service, words of affirmation, and physical touch.

As much as I love receiving all five demonstrations of care, I’ve always felt that my truest love language was missing from this list.

My love language is curiosity. I show others I care for them by asking questions, learning their experiences, and being hungry for the essence of them beneath the small talk and the pleasantries. I want to see them for who they are and know what makes them tick. And I, too, want to be loved this way.

Like many recovering people-pleasers, I spent most of my life over-attuned to others’ moods and needs, accustomed to relationships in which I did all of the seeing but rarely felt seen.

While I know that people-pleasing is usually an outdated coping mechanism from childhood, I also know that my ability to get curious about others is my superpower. Regardless of its origin, it is just as much a part of me as my eye color or my heritage.

This desire to deeply understand others is a quality about myself that I love, something that I do just as much in service to myself as in service to others.

For years, my curiosity often led me to play the role of confidante and cheerleader in my relationships. Friends, partners, and acquaintances said I was an “exceptional listener.” And while I appreciated their praise, I often felt that folks cherished my companionship the way they would cherish a finely polished mirror—a smooth surface in which they could admire their own reflection.

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve determined that I’m no longer willing to be a part of one-sided relationships in which I know others inside and out, but they regard me as a foreign language. I want a person who can put their ego aside and get curious. I want someone who maps my terrain eagerly, who crests the peaks and sprints into the jagged valleys of my tales, who overturns stones for what lies hidden beneath.

As someone who spent much of her life feeling unseen, I notice when someone really makes an effort to see me.

I notice when people look directly into my eyes and ask, “But really⁠—how are you feeling today?”

I notice when people share a story and then pause to ask, “Have you ever experienced anything like that before?”

I notice when others seem just as comfortable holding space as they do taking up space.

I notice when folks treat conversations like opportunities for co-creation instead of pedestals from which to preach.

I also notice when people ask perfunctory questions and, moments later, check their phones or stare off into space.

I notice when others use my stories as springboards to leap into their own experiences.

I notice when I’m interrupted repeatedly by someone who is so eager to speak that they can’t fathom making room for anyone else.

I notice when people use me as a sounding board or a therapist with no reciprocity in sight.

With time, I have learned to leave these relationships behind. They drain me energetically and, by participating in them, I teach myself that I am not worthy of more.

I distinctly remember a friendship where, after every afternoon spent together, my body craved a two-hour nap. I remember other connections that left me feeling hallowed out and sunken, like a withered plant that hadn’t seen a glimpse of sun in weeks.

Ultimately, it was my responsibility to shift this pattern and make space in my life for healthier connections. I could continue to feel victimized by one-sided relationships, or I could leave them behind and trust that I deserved better⁠—and that better existed.

We co-create these healthier, reciprocal connections by communicating, clearly, what we need in order to feel seen. The love language framework is so valuable because it gives us a simple, casual way to do so. After all, we can’t expect others to read our minds and know automatically what’s best for us.

This is why I’ve learned to say to friends and prospective partners early on, “My love language is curiosity. I feel most loved when others ask questions and want to understand me.” By offering this simple truth, we give others the information they need to love us well. Whether they choose to act on that information is up to them.

If we find ourselves in relationships that are one-sided, we need to be willing to let them go, and embrace the initial loneliness that comes from leaving the old while awaiting the new. We need to learn to trust that we are interesting, that our experiences are valuable, and that our words are just as worthy of space as anyone else’s.

With every new relationship that makes space for the essence of us, the more believable these truths become.

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About Hailey Magee

Hailey Magee is a Codependency Recovery Coach who helps individuals conquer people-pleasing, set empowered boundaries, and master the art of speaking their truth. She has worked with over 100 clients from the US, Canada, Ireland, France, South Africa, and more. Sign up for a complimentary consultation to learn how coaching can help you live from a place of authenticity and inner freedom. You can follow Hailey on Facebook and Instagram, or visit www.haileymagee.com.

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The Day I Found Out from the Internet my Estranged Father Had Died

“The scars you can’t see are the hardest to heal.” ~Astrid Alauda

On a lazy Sunday morning as I lounged in bed, I picked up my phone, scrolled through my news feed on Facebook, and decided to Google my parents’ names.

I am estranged from my parents, and I have not had much of a relationship with them in over fifteen years; however, there’s a part of me that will always care about them.

I Googled my mother’s name first and found the usual articles about her dance classes, and her name on church and community bulletin boards. From what I was able to find, it appeared she was doing well.

Then I went on to Google my father’s name. The first item I came across was an obituary posted on the website of a business that provides cremation and burial services. However, there was no actual obituary, only a few pictures of a much younger man and a profile of a much older man.

Was this my dad’s obituary? It couldn’t be, could it? In shock, I convinced myself that it wasn’t his obituary, but I could not shake the nagging feeling that it was.

For the last month I had a feeling that something was off, that something terrible had happened or was going to happen. At the time I attributed these feelings to work stress and the global pandemic.

When I learned of the death of one of my mentors, who had been like a father to me, I attributed these feelings to this experience. Could I have been wrong?

Later that morning I decided to search for my dad’s name in the obituary section of the online local paper. His name came up instantly, and much to my horror, this was how I learned about his death.

Shock washed over me as I read the obituary. He had been dead for a month when I began having those intense, unsettling feelings of foreboding, as if something terrible had happened. It all made sense.

My full name, which I had legally changed several years ago, was mentioned in the obituary under his surviving relatives, which quickly turned my feelings of shock into rage. Did my family think that I didn’t care about him? Did they think that I didn’t have a right to know about his death?

I reached out to members of my estranged support group only to learn that many others had found out about a parent’s passing in the same manner.

Years earlier I had feared that I might find out about one of my parents passing through Google; however, I had dismissed the fear and forced myself to believe that someone in my family would tell me if one of my parents had passed.

In the days and weeks that followed I continued to Google my dad’s name. As I read tributes written by friends and other family members, I was hit with the realization that I did not know the person they were describing.

He was described as a “simple religious man who was a welcoming neighbor, a devoted friend, family man, and an excellent father.” To me, however, he was none of those things, and as I continued to read the tributes, sadness and anger washed over me, and I was forced to reflect on the painful relationship that I’d had with him.

In kindergarten I remember him telling me over and over, “You are as dumb as a post.” Later, after a visit to see his father, he repeated his father’s hurtful words, “You’re a wild hair, and you’re going to come to a sad end.”

He continued to repeat these words on a regular basis throughout our relationship. Every mistake I made was met with harsh judgements, such as “You will never be good at that, you were just wasting your time, you were never going to amount to anything.”

When I failed, he rubbed my failures in my face, and to this day failure is one of my greatest fears despite becoming a somewhat successful professional and academic.

Time and time again, he told me:

“It would be much easier to care about you if you did well with your studies.”

“You’re illiterate, you’re a delinquent, you’re a dunce, and you are an embarrassment.”

“You are never going to amount anything; you are going to end up working a minimum-wage job with angry, stupid people.”

“You are fat, you are lazy, you are unfocused, and you are wasting your time with that stupid piano; you will never amount anything with that hammering.”

After I broke up with my first serious boyfriend, my father told me, “What do you expect? A person like you is naturally going to have problems with their relationships, I fully expect you to have serious problems in your marriage as well.”

When I was preparing to move away to go to university, he told me, “When you flunk out, don’t expect to come back here, just find a minimum-wage job and support yourself.”

It’s taken me years to realize that comments like these are verbal abuse!

Verbal abuse can be disguised in the form of a parent insulting a child to do better, to push themselves to be more, to lose weight, or enter a particular field. It can be disguised as caring or wanting to push someone to be a better version of themselves. Regardless of the parent’s motive, insults and put-downs are, in fact, verbal abuse, and no number of justifications can change this.

Verbal abuse can have devastating effects on a child’s life, and these effects can be felt well into adulthood.

Throughout my childhood and into my teens, my parents’ abusive comments caused me to believe that no one would want me and that I was not good enough for anyone. This limiting belief inhibited my ability to form friendships. As a result, I spent much of my childhood and my teens alone, playing the piano or spending time with my pets.

The friendships that I did form were often one-sided because I made it very easy for people to take advantage of me, because I believed that I had to give and give in order to be worthy of the friendship.

I also feared failure more than anything else and became very anxious in any environment where I might fail. This inhibited me from trying new things, and I only engaged in activities I knew I was good at.

It was not until my mid-teens that I met a mentor who not only saw my work but loved me and nurtured me as if I was his own daughter. For the very first time in my life, I had an adult to support me apart from my grandmother and my grandfather, who believed in me and reminded me every day of my value and my abilities.

“You are good, you are smart and highly intelligent, you’re capable of doing anything you set your sights on,” he would tell me. At first, I did not believe him, but in time I slowly began to see myself through his eyes.

He talked to me the way a loving parent would have. When I failed, he didn’t make fun of me; instead, he encouraged me to reflect on what I’d learned from the experience and how I could do better in the future.

He distilled in me the foundation of shaky self-confidence that enabled me to have the courage to apply to university. Without this relationship, I would likely not be where I am today because I would not have had the courage to break free from the verbally abusive narrative my parents had taught me to believe, or to challenge this narrative.

As I was reading attributes about my father in tributes from people who knew him, I was filled with a sense of longing. Had my dad been the man who was described in those tributes we could have had a healthy relationship, and I would not have had to make the painful decision to cut him out of my life.

At the same time, these tributes forced me to accept that we are many things to different people. To some people we are a wonderful friend, a kind neighbor, and a loving parent, but to others we are a rude jerk, a self-centered person, and verbally abusive or neglectful parent. Each one of us has the right to remember the dead as they experienced them and honor their memory as we see fit.

Years after cutting my parents out of my life I silently forgave them for the hurt they had caused me, and I worked to let go of the pain from the past. However, at times, I found myself fantasizing about what a healthy adult relationship could look like with my father.

I imagined mutually respectful philosophical discussions, long walks, trips to far off places, and most importantly, being seen not as an unlovable failure, but as a successful adult worthy of love and acceptance.

My last conversation with my father before my grandmother had passed away was positive, which only fueled these fantasies. Yet in these fits of fantasy, I was forced to accept my father for who he was and acknowledge the painful fact that some people are just not capable being who we need them to be.

We can choose to plead for a relationship that will never be, or for the person to be something they are not, or we cannot choose to accept them as they are and accept ourselves in spite of their abuse. But this means we must let go and accept that the future holds time we can never have together.

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About Jen Hinkkala

Jen Hinkkala is a PhD student, researcher, and teacher of music and arts education in Canada. As a researcher Jen strives to understand what factors and experiences lead to higher levels of wellness, resiliency, self-care among arts educators. You can find her new Facebook group for adult children estranged from their parents here.

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7 Things You Need to Know If You’re Going Through a Painful Breakup

Last year my uncle died shortly after someone I love went through a pretty traumatic breakup. I love all my family, but I wasn’t really close to my uncle and didn’t know him all that well, so I was more grieving for my mother and aunt than myself.

As I bore witness to the deep pain around me, I started thinking about the expectations we often hold of people when grieving a breakup, as opposed to grieving a death. We often expect them to feel sad for a while and then just get over it. Because the person didn’t die, after all.

I would never compare the loss of someone’s life to the loss of a relationship, but I wonder, do we even have to? Can’t we just honor both types of losses as difficult in their own way and respect that healing takes time for each?

I know from personal experience that breakups can evoke all kinds of complicated emotions.

They can trigger the pain of past traumas—times when people we trusted betrayed, neglected, or abandoned us.

They can conjure up deep feelings of shame and unworthiness, particularly if we blame ourselves for everything that went wrong.

They can ignite all our fears about being alone and what we believe that means about us and for us—maybe that we’ll never be happy because we’re unlovable, and no one will ever want us.

And they can force us to face parts of ourselves we’d rather avoid, pieces of a puzzle we’ve tried to complete with other people’s love, affection, and approval.

Then there’s the pain of accepting someone’s cruelty, if they weren’t emotionally mature enough to end things well, taking responsibility for their part and offering some sense of closure.

None of this is easy to get past. And there’s no set timeline for healing.

The truth of the matter is, it takes as long as it takes. That doesn’t mean there’s nothing we can do to help ourselves heal and move forward. It’s just means that even if we do all the “right” things, the pain may still linger, and that’s okay.

It’s also totally understandable—in general, and especially now, when we’re far more limited in our options for getting in the world, doing things we love, and engaging with other people. All things that help when you’re trying to empower and focus on yourself.

If you’re feeling the pain of heartbreak right now, I hope you know you deserve a ton of credit for doing your best to get through this, especially during this crazy, surreal time. I hope you’re kind to yourself as you navigate the emotional landmine that is healing. And I hope the following pieces of advice, from Tiny Buddha contributors, help ease your pain, even if only a little:

1. It’s okay if you’re not over it yet.

“Healing takes time. Give yourself grace because it is the loving thing to do.

Would you keep asking your best friend why she isn’t over her heartbreak yet? No! That would be unloving, she needs grace. Feeling impatient with your progress or beating yourself up? GRACE. Just cried for hours on the couch even though you’ve had two amazing weeks? GRACE. Behaved in a way that you later felt bad about? Those are old habits arising, my friend—GRACE.”

~Lauren Bolos, from How to Come Out Stronger After Heartbreak

2. You won’t feel this way forever.

“There is, in fact, a light in the end of the depression tunnel. But the only way to get to that light is to walk through it. There is no way of getting around the process, and the earlier you begin the journey of mourning and healing, the sooner you will reach peace.

The journey is long, but there is no race and no competition. It’s a journey with yourself. There will be days when you will feel stronger than ever and some days will bring you back to your knees.

Just remember: The rollercoaster is the journey. So even when you are down, feeling as if you’ve made no progress, remember that progress is being made every day you choose to be alive.

Progress is being made every day you choose to not call the one who left you.

Progress is being made every day you choose to take another breath.

You are alive. You are strong. You will survive.”

~Brisa Pinho, from Grieving a Loss That Feels Like a Death

3. You deserve a lot of credit.

“Take credit for the good that came out of this relationship. No, it wasn’t all perfect, and there are some things you can take responsibility for in your past relationship, but what can you take credit for?

If you blame yourself for all the bad things, don’t you also have to take some credit for the good things that happened?

What positives came out of this relationship?

How did you grow as a person in your past relationship?

How did you mature and become a better version of yourself?”

~Vishnu, from How to Stop Punishing Yourself for Your Breakup

4. Your ex wasn’t perfect.

“Remember the bad as well as the good. Brain scientists suggest nearly 20 percent of us suffer from ‘complicated grief,’ a persistent sense of longing for someone we lost with romanticized memories of the relationship. Scientists also suggest this is a biological occurrence—that the longing can have an addictive quality to it, actually rooted in our brain chemistry.

As a result, we tend to remember everything with reverie, as if it was all sunshine and roses. If your ex broke up with you, it may be even more tempting to imagine she or he was perfect, and you weren’t. In all reality, you both have strengths and weaknesses and you both made mistakes.

Remember them now… it’s easier to let go of a human than a hero.”

~Lori Deschene (me!), from How to Let of a Past Relationship: 10 Steps to Move on Peacefully

5. No relationship is a failure.

“Our society seems to put a lot of pressure on the idea that things will last forever. But the truth is, everything is impermanent.

After a recent breakup, I found myself feeling as though I had failed the relationship. Then I stepped outside of my conditioned thinking and discovered that love and failure do not reside together. For when you have loved, you have succeeded, every time.

It was Wayne Dyer that introduced me to the rather practical concept that ‘not every relationship is meant to last forever.’ What a big burden off my back! Of all the souls hanging out on this planet, it seems to make sense that we might have more than one soul mate floating around.

Relationships can be our greatest teachers; it is often through them that we discover the most about ourselves. In relationships, we are provided with an opportunity to look into a mirror, revealing what we need to work on as individuals in order to be the best version of ourselves.

Each relationship will run its course, some a few weeks, months, years, or even a lifetime. This is the unknown that we all leap into.”

~Erin Coriell, from How to Love More and Hurt Less in Relationships

6. If you change your perspective, it will be easier to heal.

“Whatever story you’re telling yourself about the relationship, you need to retell it. You may be holding onto the sad and tragic version. You were left behind as the victim, as your ex was the heartbreaker who didn’t give the relationship a chance.

Shift the story to the one that is the most empowering for you. How about a story of how you both gave it your best? You fought, you loved, you laughed, and you cried. You tried over and over when things didn’t seem to work. You fought, forgave, broke up, got back together, and finally called it off for good.

You both gave it your all, but it didn’t work out. It wasn’t for lack of trying. It was you coming to the conclusion that you were different people, both good people, who were incompatible for each other. You both helped each other grow and become better versions of yourself.

The more you can flip your perspective on your ex and the relationship, the easier it will be to move on.”

~Vishnu (from How to Move on When Your Ex Already Has)

7. Sometimes you have to make your own closure.

“Closure is something everyone would like. We would like validation and understanding.

We can accept that someone doesn’t want to be with us. We can accept that the relationship has changed or that they want something else. What we can’t accept is our partner’s inability to communicate that fact effectively and tell us what went wrong.

Unfortunately, sometimes your partner does not have this same need, or they may have the same need but they’re better at hiding it and pretending they don’t. They would rather just push you, and their feelings, away.

In my experience, people can’t always be honest with you because they can’t be honest with themselves. It isn’t about you. We always want it to be about us and our flaws and failures, but it isn’t.

Many people don’t know how to deal with the emotions that come with a breakup, so they prefer to avoid their feelings altogether, and this is the most likely reason they won’t talk to you. It has nothing to do with you or the relationship or something you did wrong or that you weren’t enough.”

~Carrie Burns (from How to Move on When Your Ex Won’t Speak to You)

—

I suspect that last one is something many people to need to hear. You may have played a roll in your breakup, but if your ex hasn’t treated you with empathy and respect, it’s not your fault. No one deserves to be ignored. No one deserves to be treated like they don’t matter. And just because someone treats you that way, it doesn’t mean it’s true.

I know when I was in the depths of heartbreak I needed a reminder that, regardless of the mistakes I’d made or how my ex saw me, I was still a good person who was worthy of love and healing. And you are too. So love yourself and give yourself the time and empathy you need to heal.

You are strong, you are doing the best you can, and you can and will get through this!

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About Lori Deschene

Lori Deschene is the founder of Tiny Buddha. She’s also the author of Tiny Buddha’s Gratitude Journal and other books and co-founder of Recreate Your Life Story, an online course that helps you let go of the past and live a life you love. She recently launched a Mindfulness Kit to help reduce our stress and increase our peace and joy. For daily wisdom, join the Tiny Buddha list here. You can also follow Tiny Buddha on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

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How to Motivate Yourself with Kindness Instead of Criticism

“I don’t always make the best choices, but today I choose compassion over intolerance, sympathy over hatred, and love over fear.” ~LJ Vanier

It’s crazy to me now, to look back and realize how freaking hard I was on myself for decades.

Had I ever talked to anyone else the way I talked to myself, it would surely have left me friendless and jobless, and I definitely would have been kicked out of school.

Basically, I was a bully. Just to myself.

If I said something awkward, I called myself an idiot.

When I couldn’t find the motivation to clean my house, I called myself a lazy slob.

If I wasn’t invited to a party, I told myself it’s because no one liked me.

When work projects were hard, and I had to make it up as I went, I told myself that I was going to get fired as soon as my boss figured out that I had no idea what I was doing.

My parents set high expectations of me. A’s were rewarded and B’s were questioned: “Why didn’t you get an A?”

They are successful, intelligent people (who somehow also are able to keep a clean house, like all the time), so if I did anything that didn’t meet what I assumed were their expectations, I told myself, “I’m not good enough, I’ll never be good enough.”

At a certain point, I realized this “strategy” wasn’t working out for me.

It wasn’t making me any smarter or more successful.

It wasn’t making people like me more.

It wasn’t getting my house any cleaner.

What it was doing was making me feel like crap. Every day. And it got old.

Looking back, I realize now my catalyst for change was when I finally pushed past my social anxiety and found the courage to take classes at the gym.

I found that I performed better when in a group because of the positive energy of people cheering me on.

After a while I noticed I didn’t cheer people on quite as much as they cheered me on, and since it felt good for me to hear it, I busted through my fears and started cheering on everyone else in the class.

It felt really good.

It felt even better when it dawned on me that I could talk to myself that way too.

And that is what self-compassion really is.

What is Self-Compassion, Anyway?

Self-compassion is speaking to yourself as kindly and empathetically as you would a friend.

It involves consciously directing kindness inward.

Self-compassionate people recognize that being imperfect, failing, and experiencing challenges are all inevitable parts of life, so they’re gentle with themselves when confronted with painful experiences rather than getting angry when life falls short of their expectations.

Therefore, they speak in kind words—intentionally—to themselves.

It is recognizing the shared humanity in our suffering and difficult experiences.

When we’re being compassionate toward someone who is going through a hard time or has made a mistake, we say things like:

• “You’re not alone.”
• “Everyone makes mistakes.”
• “You’re only human.”
• “I’ve been there too.”

Because there is comfort in recognizing that pain and making mistakes is part of life, it’s part of the process, it’s how we grow, and we all do it—literally every human.

When we don’t take the time to say that to ourselves when we misstep, we feel isolated, and isolation breeds shame and separation and makes us feel worthless.

Why We Are So Darn Hard on Ourselves

We live in a success-driven, “no pain no gain,” “win at all costs,” “if you have time to lean you have time to clean,” “failure isn’t an option” kind of culture.

There is nothing wrong with pushing ourselves and driving success.

The problem is, we are a mimicking species, and when all we see are examples of people being hard on themselves and few or no examples of people being kind to themselves, we don’t know what that looks like.

So the idea of self-compassion is foreign to most people. As such, we have these misconceptions that keep us from being self-compassionate.

Myth #1: I need high self-esteem to feel good about myself.

One of the biggest misconceptions about self-compassion is that it is the same as self-esteem.

We grow up believing that high self-esteem is the key to feeling good about ourselves.

The problem is, in our culture, to have high self-esteem, we have to be above average or special in some way.

It’s almost an insult to be considered “average.” If someone were to say, “There’s nothing special about her” that would make a person feel especially bad.

So, by this measure, self-esteem is conditional to everyone else’s status in comparison to ours. Our self-esteem (and therefore self-worth) go up and down as those around us go up and down.

That’s why there are so many bullies in our society—because putting others down is one way to make your self-esteem go up.

(There are literally studies showing an increase in bullies and narcissism in our society in the past several years, and many psychologists point to the “self-esteem” movement as a big factor.)

Myth #2: I need to be hard on myself, or I’ll let myself get away with anything.

A lot of people have the misconception that self-compassion is self-indulgence.

They worry that they could be too self-compassionate and too soft on themselves, that they need to be hard on themselves in order to keep on track.

But self-compassion enhances motivation, it doesn’t hinder it.

Let’s say your friend is upset that she texted someone, and they haven’t texted her back.

Do you say to her, “That’s probably because you did something wrong. I bet she doesn’t like you anymore, or maybe she never really did. You should apologize even though you don’t know what you did wrong, since she is most likely mad at you for something.”

Absolutely not!

Not only is it a mean thing to say, you know objectively that this is almost certainly not true.

You would likely say, “I know that feeling too. I get disappointed when I don’t get a response from someone. But she likely forgot or is busy, just like a lot of people. Her not replying isn’t a reflection of you, it’s an inaction by her. Don’t worry, she still might message you back, or you can message her again later!”

Which one of those feels more motivating? Which one feels more stressful?

Which way do you talk to yourself when you slip up?

The motivational power of your inner bully comes from fear, whereas the motivational power of self-compassion comes from love.

How to Practice Self-Compassion

1. Mindfully recognize when you hear your inner critic talking.

We get so used to using negative self-talk that we don’t even notice it. We just run with the critical stories we’re telling ourselves.

But you can’t change anything unless you recognize when you’re doing it by mindfully bringing attention to your thoughts, without judgment.

First, notice how you feel. Because self-criticism feels crappy. That’s your sign that you need to do a little mindful digging.

Now, the best tool you can use when you get that sign is to ask, “What is the story I’m telling myself?”

• The story I’m telling myself is that people at work think I’m a fraud because I’m making everything up as I go, and I’m not giving myself any credit for all that I do know and have achieved.
• The story I’m telling myself is that I’m not a good mom because I let my house get messy, and I’m not thinking about how happy and healthy my kids actually are.
• The story I’m telling myself is that I’ll never lose weight because I ate those cookies, and I’m not giving myself permission to make a mistake.

What is the story you’re telling yourself, and what language are you using to tell it?

2. Understand the positive intent behind your negative self-talk.

This is going to help you reframe your negative self-talk into self-compassion.

Let’s say you’ve been wanting to lose weight, but you look down and realize you just ate an entire box of cookies.

And now your harsh inner critic is saying, “You’re disgusting, you’ll never be able to lose weight, you have no self-control, this is why you’re so fat.”

Again, words we would never say to someone else.

What is the positive intent, what is that self-critic voice trying to achieve?

• It wants me to be more conscious of when I’m eating and what I’m eating.
• It wants me to be a little stronger when I have these cravings so I can lose weight.
• It wants me to make a better choice in the future.

Right? It’s not trying to beat you up for the sake of beating you up. That voice has a purpose, it’s just using the wrong words.

3. Reframe that positive intent with self-compassion.

Restate what your self-critic is saying with the voice of self-compassion by talking to yourself as you would a friend or loved one, recognizing the shared humanity in the experience, and consoling in the fact that this too shall pass.

Can you look inward and say, “I see what you’re doing here. Thanks, subconscious, for the reminder, I know you’re just looking out for me. Now that we’ve heard what you have to say through the self-critic voice, let’s hear what the self-compassion voice has to say…”

What would that sound like?

“I get it, I’ve had a stressful day, I skipped lunch, and I’m tired, so I just fell back on an old habit—I made a mistake. Now that I know why I ate all those cookies, I can make a better decision tomorrow. All is not lost.”

Which one of these feels better? Which one would motivate you to do better tomorrow?

4. If you think you can’t be self-compassionate…

If and when during this growth process, you find yourself thinking, “I just can’t stop talking to myself in that negative way, it doesn’t feel natural to speak positively to myself,” I want you to understand two things…

First, self-compassion is a habit.

That negative self-talk you’ve been doing for years has simply become a habit.

It’s become your habitual reaction to stress, adversity, and failure. And that’s what we’re doing here: breaking old habits and creating new ones.

It will be a challenge at first, as are all new habits. But with some practice, this is going to get easier and easier. It’s making self-compassion your new default mode.

It will feel weird and unnatural at first. Don’t let that make you think it isn’t working. The more you practice this, the more you are training your brain to focus on compassionate self-talk instead of criticism, meaning you’ll spend less and less time with that critical language and more time with the compassionate language. In time, this will become your new, natural response.

Eventually, you’ll reach a point where you say, “Hm, if I did that a year ago, I would have beat myself up for days. Good for me!”

#2 You have a natural negativity bias that is working hard right now.

When you feel like you can’t be self-compassionate, understand our natural negativity bias.

We all have a negativity bias. It’s there with the intention to keep us safe. Your ancestors who were on the lookout for mountain lions lived longer than those who sniffed flowers all day.

But we are centuries beyond the point in our evolution where we need to be on guard in order to keep safe at all times. When you’re living with chronic stress and anxiety, your negativity bias is sticking in the on position.

Meaning, all you can see are threats. What could go wrong. What is wrong. What might be wrong. If you get a ninety on a test, you look at that ten that you missed and not the ninety that you achieved.

Know that you have blinders on to positivity, that your negativity bias is making you focus solely on challenges instead of achievements.

It’s what I call wearing poop-colored glasses instead of rose-colored glasses. Mindfully notice when you’re wearing them. Then take the glasses off! (They smell and they aren’t helping anything, anyway!)

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About Sandy Woznicki

Sandy is a former anxiety-riddled, insomniac stress-aholic turned coach. She helps career-driven women and working moms master their stress and anxiety, to motivate themselves with kindness instead of criticism, to face life’s challenges with Graceful Resilience, and to start truly enjoying life without all that unnecessary worry.  Her coaching and free resources like the Stress Detox Mini Course help women to take back control of their lives to live more fully and freely.

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10 Things to Do When You Feel Sad, Hopeless, and Defeated

“Rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.” ~J.K. Rowling

I’m no stranger to feeling hopeless and defeated. After many failed relationships, physical, sexual and emotional abuse my entire life, two bankruptcies, and the recent loss of my online business (October 2020), you could say I’ve been through enough to last two lifetimes.

I’ll admit, there were many times I wanted it all to end. There were many days I just didn’t know how much more I could handle. My recent loss has devastated me beyond words. Everything I’ve worked so hard for in the last three years has completely been obliterated. I’m numb and feel defeated almost every day.

At fifty-eight years old, starting over doesn’t interest me, but I have no choice. I know what to expect. I’ve been here before. It’s ugly, messy, frustrating, stressful, and exhausting. Every day I wake up I don’t really feel like getting to the computer to work.

I don’t really feel like doing anything, to be honest, but lay in bed and cry. I go through serious waves of anxiety throughout the day. They hit me fast, hard, and without warning. I want to throw up. I want to curl up in a ball and die. I want someone to tell me this is all a bad dream and tomorrow things will be back to normal.

None of that happens. And I force myself to get to work and start a new day.

Your Struggles and Pain Are Real

Pain is pain, chaos is chaos. No matter what it looks like to you. Never let anyone tell you your feelings are ridiculous. Don’t ever think that you’re overreacting. What your feeling is real, and you need to honor your emotions, feel all the feels. Just don’t stay there. The longer you stay down, the harder it is to get back up.

Here are ten things to do when you are feeling defeated, hopeless, helpless, and sad—all things that have helped me, that I hope help you too.

1. Cry your eyes out.

Too many of us hold back our tears because we think it’s a sign of weakness. It is absolutely not, and it’s almost mandatory to get those tears out. Go back to the last time you had a good cry fest and try to remember how you felt afterward. I’m guessing you felt like a ton of bricks was just lifted off your shoulders.

Crying is very therapeutic. Do it. As often as you have to. Scream and cry into a pillow if you have to but get those tears out.

2. Call a friend.

While this almost sounds too simple, most don’t even think about doing this either because they don’t want to burden their friends, or because they’re too stuck on their problems to consider talking about something else.

Pick one person you absolutely love talking to and just chat your cute little face off. You can talk about your problem if you think it will help, or you can use this as an opportunity to get your mind off of things. Just talk!! About anything, everything, silly things and nothing.

I remember the day my business crashed, and I was so angry and upset but also embarrassed because I didn’t want anyone to know what happened to me and that my business was gone. After a week I decided to call one of my dear friends, and not only was he great at comforting me but also reassuring me that things were going to be okay. It was such a huge relief to get this confirmation from a friend.

Sometimes we need to hear comforting words!

3. Volunteer.

I tell everyone this. If you’re sad, go volunteer. Like right now. You can’t even imagine the power behind helping someone or something (aka furry critters) in need. Your heart fills up and then explodes, you cry happy tears, and it honestly just gives you so much joy.

Find an organization that resonates with you and call them. Go spend an hour a week there. This will soon become your happy place and something you will look forward to every week.

4. Write yourself a love letter.

I’ll be honest, I haven’t written one in a while, but I think it’s time.

A love letter to yourself is so powerful and therapeutic. In this letter you tell yourself all the amazing and awesome things about yourself. You list all the reasons you shouldn’t feel like a loser. You tell yourself to brush off your bum and pick yourself back up again.

You can go on and on about how wonderfully amazing you are. Write out all the things you love about yourself and all your radiant and redeeming qualities.

Now before you say, “Oh, I don’t love anything about myself,” stop right there.

Go look in the mirror right now. I bet you have the most beautiful eyes and the most sweet smile ever. Or maybe you are a feisty, determined person. Or maybe you have a heart of gold! I bet there are a million awesome things about you. Find them and write about them.

5. Put on some loud music and sing and dance.

Oh yeah. Choose the loudest, thrashiest music you have (and love) and crank up the stereo. Or maybe you love country or jazz or whatever! Turn it up and rip off the knob. Dance, sing, jump around your house like a silly fool.

Sometimes when I’m feeling down, I put on the saddest music with the hardest hitting lyrics, sing loud, cry my heart out, and remarkably afterward I feel a million times better!!

Let loose and lose all your cares and woes in your favorite music. You’re gonna feel amazing, you’ll even get a little workout in, and your adrenaline will be pumped up a wee bit, so you’ll maybe even feel unstoppable! Go you!

6. Go for a walk.

Another simple thing to do that we often overlook. For many of us, when we’re feeling really sad, we don’t want to get dressed and go out. We want to stay inside and cry and eat junk food (more on that later), but you can’t stay there forever.

You have to get yourself out of your dark place. You have to take action steps (pardon the pun) to move forward and be happy again.

Get your shoes on and get outside. You never know who you’re going to run into or what kind of super cool things can happen to you. Be open to surprises and chance meetings. Or maybe you’ll just find and see little things that bring a smile to your face.

7. Watch funny movies and eat junk food.

Yes, I said it. Eat junk food, aka comfort food. They call it comfort food for a reason. Because that’s exactly what it does. And yes, I get that we may have a teeny sore belly in the morning, all depending on how much comfort food you consumed the night before, but really, chocolate and chips and donuts and cake really do the soul good.

A small word of warning here, though: Only do this if you can let yourself enjoy eating and aren’t mindlessly binging to numb your feelings, and please don’t make this a daily habit. We all know eating junk food is bad for us. It’s a nice quick fix on a really sad day but not something you should do all the time. Remember, life is all about balance too. That includes your eating habits.

So find your fave movies—I usually opt for funny ones or super action thrillers—and lose yourself in it. Forget your cares and woes even if only for two hours or so and let yourself indulge a little.

8. Write a truth letter.

Yes, I love writing letters. It’s the best therapy out there, I swear! Much like a love letter to yourself, a truth letter is a letter you will write to someone or something that is causing you grief and sorrow.

This is where you get to write out all your anger, all your hurt; every damn emotion you feel about this person/thing, get it all out! I know some people who have written truth letters that were thirty pages long. You write until you can’t write anymore!

This is something you can do every time you have hateful or angry thoughts about this person or thing. Eventually the thoughts won’t show up so often.

9. Set a timer.

We already know we can’t stay in this sad dark place for too long, or it will consume us. After a few weeks of feeling like this set a timer for fifteen minutes, twice a day. In this time slot, feel angry, sad, cry, scream, or do whatever else you have to do, but when the timer is up try to compose yourself and shift your attention elsewhere—on your work, a hobby, helping a friend, anything other than your own problems.

Negative thoughts will arise outside of your time slot. But remember, you can choose whether or not to engage with them. You always have a choice to let your thoughts pass without getting caught up in your mental stories. That’s up to you to do.

Yes, this is hard to do, but the benefit is that you are allowing yourself time to grieve without allowing your grief to totally consume you and dominate your days.

10. Have a ‘me’ day.

Even if you can’t take the whole day, try to take at least a few hours to pamper yourself. Get a manicure or pedicure or do one for yourself at home. Get your hair done, take yourself out on a date. Do something you enjoy, something that gets you into a state of flow.

Whatever it is that you do, do it in honor of yourself and how amazing you are. Take this time to love yourself, as hard as that may be, and just be present with you and only you.

—

As I go through my difficult time, I keep telling myself that this is temporary, I’m gonna be okay, and to keep the faith. I believe everything always works out in the end, exactly the way it’s supposed to, whether we understand it or not, and this brings me comfort.

But don’t deny your emotions.

I think the most important thing to remember is that you must honor and feel your feelings, but you can’t stay there. It’s important to take steps to get back to your ‘normal,’ whatever that looks like for you, or to accept that it’s time to create a new normal.

Baby steps are better than no steps at all. Do one or two little things every day and before you know it, you’ll be smiling and feeling better about yourself and life again.

You got this, babe!

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About Iva Ursano

Iva is a retired hairstylist turned freelance writer from Northern Ontario Canada living a life of freedom, peace, and joy in sunny Guatemala. Her two main goals in life are to inspire people around the world with her blogs and to feed hungry little bellies in the poor town she now calls home. She has a mini-series of self-help eBooks you can check out here or you can head over to her website for more inspiration and sign up to her weekly motivational and inspirational newsletters.

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What to Do If You’re Single and Feel Like You’re Missing Out

Going to weddings alone, with no plus-one to take along with you. Watching the couples dance, thinking, “Will there ever come a time when that is me on the dance floor?” Going on holidays alone, with no partner to share memories with. Listening to stories of friends’ weekends away, as a reminder of just how solitary your own weekends are. If you are anything like me, you might recognize these signs of single life.

“Will my situation and circumstances ever change?” I’d think as I struggled to fall asleep at night. I’d hold a pillow as a source of comfort, yet this too disappeared in the morning, when I woke up alone to face the day.

Many single people think like this, yet rarely voice these thoughts. But sometimes we hit a turning point when we start to see everything differently—and then start to act differently.

The turning point for me came one Saturday morning. After I had gotten dressed and ready, I sat down on a chair next to my bed. A photo of a couple friends was in front of me. They were on holiday, with smiles on their faces, standing under a bright blue sky with a clear blue sea behind them.

As I looked at this picture of serenity and happiness, I had a sinking, empty feeling in my stomach. I thought, “God, will that ever be me?” I looked down in front of me and felt a sense of despair, worried about what my future held but paralyzed as to what I could do about it.

At that moment I thought, “Enough.” I walked to the bathroom and looked in the mirror. I was tired of feeling sorry for myself. I was tired of watching the world go by. I was tired of the sad thoughts going around in my head like goldfish in a fishbowl.

I asked myself then, “What do I have to be upset about?” I had a roof over my head, clothes on my body, and food in my mouth. That’s not to say it’s not normal to long for companionship when you’re single; it’s just that I had focused so much on was wrong with my life that I hadn’t focused on what was right about my life. And I’d also focused on what was wrong with myself—as if there must have been something wrong for me to be single for so long.

Until I became my own cheerleader, how could I expect others to start cheering for me? I decided then and there to take action. If I wasn’t happy with myself, I had to go out and change, and do things to change. Not just daydream and hope life would turn around by itself.

So, what did I do?

I’ve worked on enjoying my single life more and joined some dating apps to “get in the ring.” The results have proven mixed. Like with all things in life, there are good days and bad days. But on the whole, it’s been a positive experience because I’ve met some great people in my search for the person who ‘gets me.’

I’ve realized we can only experience true happiness in life if we focus on ourselves instead of waiting for others to focus on us. People can join us for our stories, but we cannot expect them to complete our stories for us. We make our own paths in life. Walking on paths well-trodden will never be as satisfying as carving paths of our own, however rocky or imperfect they may be.

So, what helped me move ahead? Here are four things that may help you:

1. Work on loving yourself and your life.

Work on yourself before trying to attract somebody else. A natural result of working on yourself you will exude a glow of confidence. Your zest for life will radiate from your face, and you will naturally look and feel better to others.

Work on developing positivity in your life. Embrace what you have, not what you wish you had or what your neighbor has. Read more, study more, travel more. Exercise for twenty minutes a day, try cooking one new dish a week, read or watch something every day that inspires you.

Why should people get to know you? Evaluate the qualities you like about yourself and sing your own praises in your head each time you doubt how worthy you are.

2. Be proactive.

Join a few dating apps, take a few chances, take the time to connect with people. Bumble and Hinge are easy to use. You’ll meet new people and engage a new mindset.

Get active and make the effort to swipe for a few minutes each day. What’s more, enjoy the process. Look beyond the photos. Recognize that there is a whole person behind the photo if you are willing to give that person a chance. Look for the gold in the profiles.

3. Pay more compliments.

If you see something you like on a profile, don’t be afraid to say it. You could make somebody’s day with your words. It costs nothing and it could provide just the lift they need. And the beauty of giving compliments is that you’ll likely get some in return—things people may have thought but otherwise not shared if you hadn’t gone first—which can help radically build your self-confidence.

4. Focus on achieving one big goal a month.

Write down twelve goals for each of the twelve months in the year. Buy a paper diary and write down how you are going to fill your time for the next week. Do something you wouldn’t ordinarily do. The person you seek should not compensate for all the things you are not; they should be an extension of all the things that you are. The more you live life, the more life you will have to share with a significant other.

Review your progress once a week. Ask yourself, are you making too much time for people that do not have the time for you? Ruthlessly discard the things that don’t make you happy (people, pursuits, things) and selfishly embrace the things that do. Be generous with others and selfish with yourself.

So, in summary, what can you do to improve your dating life?

Treat yourself with the care you would treat a friend, broaden your mind and your approach when using dating apps, compliment freely, and give yourself one big thing to look forward to each month.

True happiness in life can only be experienced when we focus on inside joy, not when we look for external fixes. Invite people into your life to join your life story and not to build your life story. Be your own cheerleader first to allow others to cheer for you.

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About Bhavin

Bhavin works for an investment bank in London in London. He enjoys personal development and wanted to share this story with you. If he helps one person; then this will have been worth it. Contact him at JB299648@gmail.com and he will be pleased to hear from you.

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The post What to Do If You’re Single and Feel Like You’re Missing Out appeared first on Tiny Buddha.

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