Blog - Couples Therapy Better Treasures

October 17, 2024October 17, 2024

Finally Resolve Conflict: Shared vs Solo Time?

Hello you two,

Attached is the Dreams Within Tool we discussed in session. Homework is to pre-process (so working up your answers alone) the 9 questions in the Dreams Within tool. This will help you to prepare for a better discussion with your partner in our next session. Key is to explore and define your ideal dream, not denigrating or reducing your Needs, Wishes, Dreams (NWD) in any way! In fact, do the opposite: Go big or go home. The closer to your truth is your pitch, the more detail integrated, the more meaning…all these are essential for building common bridges between two Undoubtedly different positions.

…My couple faced the super-familiar conflict of reconciling differences between appetites for shared time together and solo-discretionary time. This includes the resources allocated for personal discretion and resources for funding time together. They needed to identify whether their differences could be managed. And they were looking at the decision to decide whether to stay together and eventually family-build, or to terminate their relationship. High-stakes conversations.

While we can’t absolutely predict how we will feel in the future, we can look to the past and examine our appetites and metabolism for time apart and time together.

We can identify our current workflows for sourcing, funding, and replenishing resources needed to enjoy Shared and Solo Time. We also probably can come up with an estimation of our flexibility as to resources to devote to Shared vs. Solo Time. Similarly, we can probably identify a level of commitment to resource distribution in the service of Shared vs. Solo Time that would leave us feeling resentful and over-committed.

And yet… We are also greatly capable of adjusting to limits, and stepping up to the plate and playing ball when requested.

Sometimes it is helpful to connect to our history of flexibility. For instance, what limitations have we faced before, and…

What helped us to accept limits, domains of our control or influence, while preserving our own sense of dignity, integrity, and autonomy or freedom? For many of us, acceptance requires meaning-making, redefining, and symbolism.

We face limits every day (taxes, speed limits, etiquette). More often than not we buy-in to the greater good even when doing so conflicts against desire, instinct, or impulse. How can we apply greater-good-thinking in strategic allocation of our interpersonal portfolio? We need to be communicating our visions And limits in rebalancing personal assets. Think energy, attitude, resources invested in service of healthy relationships (relational goals).

Identifying differences is a first step in an empowered journey toward greater granularity in knowing and in developing ‘self-in-context’ (who we are and want to be across different situations and scenarios).

For instance, if one partner has identified they would expect family dinner 6 nights a week (saving 1 night for date night ;o), and the other desires 1 Sunday family meal, that’s a big difference, with loads of room to identify better (temporary) compromises.

Our next step is to increase cognitive flexibility. Ask yourself, ‘if I went up/down to 3-4 dinners per week and 1 breakfast, what might I need to make that work?’

What is within my power to shift and shape to (temporarily) enjoy and even deeply appreciate the current shared agreement.

Further, as I envision my (and their) roles and responsibilities in the agreement, what are some ways I might iterate proposed agreements to improve my own experience?

What might a Venn Diagram elucidate in terms of common ground (how are shared meals most enjoyable/desireable)?

Can you identify changes to Situation, Roles, Responsibilities might be fully up to me to alter?

Are there any, adaptations/accommodations to R&R or situation/environment you might invite my partner to accept, assist, assume, or adopt in the service of qualitatively improving shared agreements?

These questions posed here and the big 9 Questions in the Gottman Method’s Dreams Within tool will offer my clients the greatest chance to unlock their gridlock.

They will likely find areas where they are not SO far apart that they cannot build temporary or more permanent bridges.

They will have the best chance if they can remember to validate differences in perspectives, if they can maintain regulation by substituting 4 Horsemen for their Antidotes when triggered, and if they can signal COAL when in the Listening role to reach Shared Understanding . And if they remember that Prioritization of Shared Mutual Understanding is the Prerequisite for Negotiating. It’s much to ask, but with support, I’ve seen most couples succeed. And I am rooting for them!

After inevitably recognizing enduring differences, every couple sooner-or later faces the task to revisit difficult agreements. They must signal safety in Turning Toward and in compassionately holding ongoing suffering together. They must acknowledge, recognize, and accept that differences are likely to persist even after creating temporary compromises (resource allocation/distribution strategies). And they must find their way to signaling a welcoming of the Rebalance conversation.

I hope you, in addition to my couple, find that these are great questions to loosen up and identify opportunities for dynamic change across time. Positions of our own sufficient control and other positions possibly recommending experimentation. Happy Rebalancing!

If you are ready for upgrading your conflict management practices, book a free consultation and your Relationship Assessment.

Access Dr. Mason’s Calendar https://bettertreasures.clientsecure.me/ to book today!

March 21, 2023

Choose-Your-Own Fantasy Date Night–for the couples having trouble putting themselves back out there together.

This comes to you from working with a couple who have put romantic affection for one another on the back-burner. …for so long, it has been forgotten. And it is hard to reboot. To do so, fantasy helps. I encouraged them to reconnect to an earlier-less -cynical version of themselves. It doesn’t really matter if you go back to when you were 8 or 9 years old, the point is to reconnect to creativity, openness, your aliveness, and dreaming. Here is their homework assignment:

Your homework for the week is to dream about an ideal date night arrangement. You will want to think about what would really appeal to you about a plan together; what is the ideal plan for you?

How would you get started? How would it end?

Also thinking deeply about what is in the plan that is essential for making it a thing you would look forward to doing together. We will talk more about this in the coming weeks. This is a skill that takes time to develop. It requires introspection and self-awareness along with positive use of anticipation and fantasy. It might seem easy, but it really isn’t for many of us and for many reasons.

Next you can think about what are all the different ways in which you might achieve the essence of what brought joy about being in connection with your partner. In other words, aren’t there multiple ways in which you could bring those special moments to life? What are they?

Questions to help the process.

What about this fantasy matters to me? What would moving through this fantasy provide for me; how would I be receiving support from my partner–in what way? What are the elements of the fantasy that feel most achievable, which ones seem difficult to acknowledge? Is my initial reaction to reject what comes up for me? Won’t this get easier if I continue to put forth effort into it? What other feelings arise that protect me from possible disappointment? How do I Turn Towards what comes up for me? How do I shut myself down? What am I telling myself when I am shutting myself down? Is that helping me to grow? What might I need in order to feel more comfortable sharing and developing my fantasies? From myself? From my partner? What would help?

Remember to use Assumption of Similarity if in doing this exercise, you notice critical feelings arise about your partner. You might try writing them down. Usually there is a fear here, …AND one or several vulnerable requests, wishes, desires–these are the keys to healing, becoming okay to realize your unmet or unfulfilled desires and then taking courage to explore how you might allow yourself to acknowledge these wishes, dreams, needs, as well as how you might invite them to be known to and requested of your loving partner. There is a skill in introducing our needs, wishes, dreams to our partner. I can help you with that.

Looking forward to our next session.

Hope this helps!

March 31, 2022

In preparing for intentional, conscious parenting…

Forging Emotional Maturity in the Self-Relationship via Secure Attachment Exercises from this Therapist

Exciting seeing your openness in moving into this wondrous transition to motherhood! Here is the link to the feelings wheel. I suggest printing it out. Your homework across the next few months, would be to secure time across your day to pause for a mini-mental-mindfulness (MMM) break, during which time you would take the pulse of what feelings you were aware of having in that present moment and then uncover a bit more psychic material about the construct of your experience of feeling that/those emotions. So, for instance, in any given MMM moment, you would pull up your feeling wheel, consult it to identify one feeling–then keep going to see if there are more feelings you may be having accompanying the one first identified.

Once you’ve written down all the feelings you might be having in that given moment, now explore one of them toward deepening your observation of what happens, process-wise, in your awareness of ‘feeling the feeling/s.’

For instance, if appalled turns into fear or contempt, or something else. What do you notice in your body? If thoughts accompany the feelings, note anyone that stands out or reemerges, but move back into a non-judgmental observational attitude, with (similar to, “of course”) an, “hmmmm, this is interesting” approach to observing what comes next. Steer away from, “what does having this feeling mean for me?” Instead, just simply note.

Write it all down. Important not to judge as what is happening is just a part of your past conditioning.

Welcome whatever comes forward with an attitude of COAL. This journaling and mindfulness serves as a deliberate act, embracing what is happening for you. Doing so with COAL, is an act of deliberate self-acceptance…the kind of self-acceptance you want to give to your progeny.

Write those down (It can be hard to identify emotions, so use the inner wheel then move outward to see if there is any specificity that clarifies the essential feel of the emotion (e.g., disappointment becomes more clearly identified as appalled–or something else perhaps not on the list…it’s a launching point)).
It is a gift to say to oneself, “I love you no matter what is happening inside of you.” “Love is not earned by feeling any this and not that.” Ultimately, you (and your child) can learn from your practice that feelings do not compel action, they are simply feelings and we have competency and mastery in tolerating and moving through whatever comes up. Nothing is reacted (acted out), we learn from our feelings, notice them and can make informed choices about behavior following our mindfulness. We choose how (or not) to respond to our experience following mindfulness. The feelings are one influence upon our behavior, not the only influence. In moving through the feelings we acknowledge any wisdom imparted there, but can also now weigh-in influences such as our goals, values, and resources and our partnerships with others before choosing behavioral responses.
C-uriosity
O-penness
A-cceptance
L-ove
Basically, COAL is a validating, non-judging, compassionate, and accepting attitude. It’s an attitude you hope to approach your new love-bug with routinely as you lean into fostering safety for your child’s experience (an experience increasingly individuated from your own, and intrinsic to existential potentiality/emergence). This attitude fosters their own flexibility, maturity, and possibility. The attitude authenticates a fundamental belief and confidence in feelings as separate from, but informative for engagement in life.

What we are looking for in our work together is feeling states that pattern with dysregulation routinely/habitually. This is where we can add the most value to your treatment. Anxiety is habit-forming. Once we remove the first layer, we often find that other emotions arise in our welcoming awareness. Interestingly enough, however, disorganized reactions to those feelings will track back to the core fear and will present new growth opportunities to practice greater emotional intelligence, flexibility, adaptability. And in so doing unlocks greater existential potentiality, more self-realization, and greater self-actualization, including emotional freedom and greater resourcefulness. Exciting!!!

February 5, 2021February 5, 2021

Investments in little, tiny, Commitment Behaviors Pay Big Relational Dividends

Commitment behaviors:

In line with the Gottman Method principle of “Small Things Often” commitment behaviors offer ways in which partners make deposits into the emotional bank account. They are also formalized rituals (shared meaning) created by partners during negotiation and reinforced in performing them time and time again with compounding valuation by partners.

A commitment behavior can be anything, from hanging up a towel, to making “eyes” at your partner from across the socially crowded room. They can be a bouquet of flowers on Friday or Monday. A phone-call to one’s partner after interacting with that particularly attractive co-worker. An agreement to disclose attractions to others along with the manner of so doing. A back-rub on Tuesday. Special dinners one counts on to celebrate a specific occasion.

The point is that they are formulated mutually, agreed upon mutually, and can be replicated regularly. They are the How we get from A to Z with regard to this or that or the other.

Pain, anger, disappointment, even joy may be the catalyzing agent to develop a commitment behavior, perhaps even a whole slew of them.

Walking you through, there is impetus for the creation of an agreed upon behavior. It comes along from the recognition or realization that life does not need to have this particular re-occurring suffering in it. What if we transformed our actions around this particular event/irritating transgression? What if we “cut a deal?”

Could we negotiate for something that would work for both of us and in so doing will engender appreciation for our partner/spouse? Careful self-aware mindfulness will prevent and work around any restrictiveness of such a deal and in fact, a good deal is good for everyone, not a 0 sum game! How can it work for everyone? This is where creativity, trust, and reliability count. Can we count on our partner’s positive attitude for the iterative nature of creating such a positively meaningful behavior?

Yes, if both partners arrive to the negotiation table fully resourced, and resolved, of sabotaging resentments. If so, then partners will want one another’s happiness; they will be motivated to remove obstacles or add a proverbial vault to our partner’s quality of life satisfaction.

No, if there are an accumulation of unforgiven injuries rolling around in the sub-flooring of our consciousness.

One can begin to find areas for commitment behaviors by moving through one’s day from waking up to going to bed. Look for parts of your day that you might dread and identify what it is about it that irritates. The same steps apply for annual, monthly, or weekly tasks, events, or celebrations. Imagine how you might ideally like something to go. That is where you begin. Create, create, create, and simplify to boil it down to what is essential here for you that might be influenced by your partner’s committed behavior.

Now you may be ready to recruit your partner’s participation in said ideal.

Now you will be ready for negotiation. You can learn more about negotiation here.

As consent-based negotiations require skill sets, working with a Couple’s therapist who specializes in NVL or Gottman Method Couples Therapy may be a valuable asset to hold until you’ve both honed the practices. After negotiations, accountability measures may be put in place. These are also consent-based negotiations.

Consent-based negotiations in short—allow us to cleanly ask our partner for their participation in what would bring us joy/relief/predictability/reassurance/surprise/etc. (i.e., any number of experiences we have self-identified). They are asks, without cajoling, manipulation, pressure, coercion, or intimidation.

What you walk away with may be iterative, but each effort along the way says, “I love you and am here for you in this life.” It says we are committed to one another’s positive experience of this life, that we participate and share in their joy and lived experience. Over and over again, it demonstrates: WE are Partners!

January 28, 2021January 30, 2021

The Magic of Rituals

Rituals build Your Family Culture. As such, they can be passed down offering a beneficial inheritance for the next generation, passing on your hard-won relational wealth!

All couples want to build a relationship that others take note of for its robust strength even during times of stress and pressure. Couples who have those relationships, don’t just luck out, they have been trail-building! What I mean is that they have numerous expedited paths to intimate connection. They can reach that space where they feel known and loved by their partner much faster than many other couples.

They reach that feeling of being Connected more quickly,…and they have more pathways to reaching that sense of “togetherness.” Why? What do they have?…RITUALS!

Your relationship might be just as good as theirs, but they have rituals of connection that serve to (just like the real physiological lift you get just from anticipating your first sip of morning brew) get them faster from (normal states of being) disconnected to happily, maybe blissfully connected. They are driving the fast car, while without rituals (Gottman’s Shared Meaning), your relationship may be driving the beater-car (nothing against the beater—it can still cross the finish line).

So what is a “Ritual” and how do we get them/implement them?

Great question/s!

Rituals can be established at many points of time across your day/night/week/weekend/month/year/etc.

They are just like your daily/routine rituals. They have a beginning, middle, and end, and you know what you get as a result. For example, brushing your teeth you might start by pulling out your toothbrush, and you end with running your tongue across your sparkling clean teeth, and internally smiling as you note your crisp breath. For a couple, a saying hello ritual will need to be replicated (hopefully) a bazillion times, so some tips are: keep it simple, make sure you like doing it, and appreciate the feeling you get when doing it and when it is complete.

Many couples create hello and goodbye rituals, daily check-ins. Weekly, there is the platinum standard date night. But there is nothing shabby about the weekly summit meeting my couples integrate into their busy schedules; it includes a celebration of what you made it through, an anticipation of what is coming up for you in the week ahead, and an accounting of what you might be needing to get through it on top. Finally, it ends with an appreciation for and acknowledgement of the ways your partner was supportive to you in the past: what works and more of that please!

There are so so so many opportunities to build couples rituals: I have lists of them I can send you if you reach out and let me know you are interested in receiving them.

To go about building your own (Shared Meaning) Rituals of Connection. You can read a book by William Doherty: The Intentional Family. Or you could ask a Couples Therapist who uses the Gottman Method in working with their couples, or you could take a stab at it by brainstorming, trying out various iterations and making adjustments until you find the right fit for your ritual in your coupledom.

Keep in mind, a successfully sound ritual is predictable. It has the following elements: (The Intentional Family–William Doherty)

- How/When/Where might it start (How do you know that it has begun: What signifies that it is starting)?
- What happens (who goes first, second, last)
- How/When/Where might it end (How would you both know it was done/over–What signifies that it is over?)?
- The development of the ritual requires equal contribution/participation. No one person creates it. Of course during development stage, one person can take the lead, but you should both be revising it as you go along so that it meets both of your needs/expectations.
- When you don’t perform the ritual–its absence is noted and lamented. Signals a good strong ritual!

We wish you the very best in creating and crafting Rituals that build Shared Meaning in your life as a couple. Or in your family if you are Single-Householding. Whatever the size and shape of your family, Rituals offer invaluable capital for building a richly rewarding journey. They are ways that you are There-For-One-Another! They are eagerly anticipated highlights; they are the dessert after the meal. They are the memories made and longed for; they are your treasure. Enjoy them!!

January 21, 2021January 21, 2021

4 Best Ways to Be Present for Others: Intentional Presence

Do you see me?

Do you care that I’m here?

Am I enough for you, or do you need me to be better in some way?

Can I tell that I’m special to you by the way that you look at me?

Photo by: Toa Heftiba

Post inspired by Maya Angelou

In every interaction with others of us, each of us arrive at the moment with the same unconscious questions. We answer each of these questions during the engagement.

Question 1: Do you see me?

We provide this answer in how we engage with the other:
Do we look at them when speaking to them, have we foreclosed on how we will respond to anything they have to say before they even say it?

In other words, have we predestined how they will respond to us and are therefore engaging with an object versus an emergent, iterative, changeable, subject?

Question 2: Do you care that I’m here?

We answer this with our greeting of the person before us. How do we begin our verbal and non-verbal hello? Or do we skip this step as we are interacting with a home appliance or app? Further, do we personalize our greeting in some way, calling up a moment shared in our last interaction which fosters a sense of continuity, an indicator that there is an actual ongoing relationship with this person even in the interim of our engagements. It says to them, “I know who you are, what you and I are about, that we have a history and that I care enough to remember it.”

Question 3: Am I enough for you, or do you need me to be better in some way?

This is an interesting question that we answer with our PRESENCE…
For instance, if the interaction’s purpose (read more about that here), calls for us to be giving someone feedback, requesting something of our partner (friend/child/co-worker/etc.), are we focused on the behavior we want to see in action or are we focusing on the behavior we don’t want to see (i.e., are we criticizing–coming through the back door of communication by not explaining what we want and instead forcing our partner to figure that out,…or even worse are we contemptuously relaying some message that if they were a decent person, they would somehow already know what to do without our explicit, illumination of our request)?

Succinctly, relaying warmth, direction, compassion and confidence about the other person (even when asking them to do something differently) is answering the third question with affirmation: I do not need YOU to be better, even when I am requesting something different of you.

Question 4: Can I tell that I’m special to you by the way that you look at me?

How is our body language, what does our affect (facial expression) say to them in the moments that we are engaging with them? Are we inviting? Dismissive? Enthusiastic? Compassionate? Rejecting? Kind? Eager? Engaging? Shut-down?

When we engage others, intentionally answering each of these questions (even 2 would be AMAZING!), we bring the full weight of our powerful presence to another. Our presence expressed in this way sets up the interaction for the best possible outcome and we free the communication from expectations. In that moment we relate to an aliveness in ourselves and in the other with whom we communicate/relate. All possibility, potentiality is tapped.

For more questions about Presence, or how to move into the presence by breaking the circuits of automatic behaviors, reach out to us; we are here to help!

Warmly,

Amanda Mason Psy.D. CAPSY26711

August 11, 2020

Sources of Anger Series: Blame following Anger

All of us confront anger from time to time and most of us experience some resistance or aversion to anger, but anger can add much value to our life when we know how to use it to our benefit.

Whether our anger stems from boundary violations, overriding a limit we weren’t aware of, social injustice, or triggers from our past, getting close to what is behind the anger is key.

Secondary to self-soothing, or co-regulation–if you have that privilege, welcoming the exploration of unmet needs or desires is paramount. Mindful utilization of anger keeps us in the problem solving/orienting driver’s seat versus becoming passenger by allowing drama take the wheel.

Blame, secondary to anger is a good indicator of drama taking the wheel. To get back into the driver’s seat, start by self-soothing the anger: amping self-caring self-talk, dropping compulsive immediacy (the need to solve everything: “Right away, right Now, two seconds later is too late”–YIKES!). If you went to blame, once you are calm enough, then you will be able to identify direct communication needed to obtain the outcome you prefer.

Ask yourself, what would I like to have happened here? How might this happen? What is needed in order for the desired outcome to be realized? How might we change some of the contributing circumstances or influences? What is my responsibility here and going further? What responsibility would I like to have? What is everyone’s role in vision achievement? How may I ask for support from others? Now you have some solid seeds for the communication exchange to follow.

Next, communicate. Explain how you would like things to go. Use direct communication by outlining your vision. If indicated, explain what it would mean to you to have the outcome you so desire. Identify how you can see yourself supporting your vision. Ask for support of others by sharing how you see their role in having your dream come true. Ask if they would be able to offer you the support that might be required. Ask if they see any problems or challenges in being able to provide that support (anticipating problems is a wonderful way to collaboratively invest in the desired outcome). Address these challenges together with flexibility and in an amicable fashion. Work together.

If your partners in the desired outcome are unwilling to provide the support as you see it, then ask them how ideally, they would go about achieving your desired outcome. Chances are good that what they share may be accepted wholly or in part. Again, be willing to be flexible and collaborative.

Commit to growth mindset about the realization of your vision. Perhaps a retooling may be called for as you and your partner review your progress (notice progress was the word and attitude needed for further revisions) in future efforts. Sometimes humor is also exceedingly helpful. Think big picture, how will you feel if you maintain goodwill and determination versus fall apart at a single or even repeated failed outcomes. As long as there is creative effort, you are making progress.

Lastly, celebrate your and your partner/s contribution and efforts! This positively reinforces problem-solving communication and collaborative attitudes. And isn’t that what we want in life?: to be accompanied by willing and eager folks who are on our team? That is a big win. A big win, achieved by harnessing the positive energetic force of anger. And prohibiting problem-solving being hijacked by blame. Job well done!

July 22, 2020July 22, 2020

Feedback Faux Pas vs. Productive Feedback

How NOT to provide feedback. —-LOL, the irony!

Follow 3 simple rules to give feedback, so it doesn’t blow up in your face.

We all want to give feedback that produces positive results, minimizes ill feelings between parties, and maximizes buy-in from our partners. Organizational psychology focuses on how to accomplish just this. We (partners, parents, friends, family & community members) can benefit from adopting successful communication practices of high-achieving, loved and inspiring leadership or partnership. Here is what we know so far:

Effective feedback is future-focused, collaborative, solution-oriented, and more clearly specifies desired outcome. It reflects recognized buy-in and assumed intact motivation; it fosters growth mindset.

It is so easy to get feedback wrong, and so easy to go off-track. We are narrowing in on how to get it right, however, and this post provides an important update to what we know about how to and how not to provide feedback.

In studies, even when the feedback was given under the premise of helping develop better behavior, feedback that highlighted the poor behavior choice and/or sought to gain agreement on establishing blame, cause, or explanation, backfired demonstrating reduced motivation for change and increased ill-will between all parties involved in the feedback.

So, it is better to avoid focusing on the past and trying to gain agreement on who and what was at fault for the failure/poor outcome as this decreases motivation and intention for change.

Here is what you want to focus on in giving feedback to your partner or your child (or your friend, or your co-worker, etc.):

State specifically —get as specific as possible about your hopes, and invite their collaborative, solution-oriented discussion of worthwhile alternative efforts/actions. Brainstorm potential solutions and identify opportunities for success.
Stay positive about the past, be reflective of your positive experience of your partner’s competence and acknowledge your assumption of their sincere motivation for success.
Stay future oriented! Avoid going back to focus on what happened in the past.

Studies showed that even when the feedback was very negative, if the feedback that was given was future-focused, it tended to be received better and led to higher reported motivation for change.

So saying,

“I am feeling horrible about missing the garbage pickup, I am so mad, so frustrated, that we will have the stink piling up in the hot summer sun, stinking up the whole entire neighborhood, throwing off the air pollution monitoring systems, sending up plumes into the cosmos and scaring away aliens that would have landed here to provided a cure for cancer, and the Corona virus! I know we both want to make the trash pick up and I do know you care. We are usually pretty good with setting up ongoing calendar reminders. It would help me if we got the trash out right after dinner clean-up, that would certainly free me up from worrying about in the evening. Maybe it might help to set a reminder for just after the time when we normally finish up dinner? What else might help or could you or we try?”

…is way better than saying,…

“You got up late again and hadn’t put it out the night before like we talked about last week, honey. We’ve just got to work on procrastination, and I do understand that your friend had called in a favor.”

The first super negative script is way more motivating for changing behavior than the last because it does not focus directly on the past behavior.

The first script stays away from labeling behavior that needs to change; instead it focuses on collaboratively identifying future behaviors that might produce a specifically different, hoped-for outcome.

In sum, do remember, that in studies, those who rated feedback discussions as most future-focused, more readily accepted feedback and indicated high intention to change even when the feedback was most negative. And keep in mind, it is a positive to initiate the conversation with expressing the goal of improving things in the future, but don’t sabotage it by focusing on the past mistake, or what explains or caused the failure. Instead, reflect and assume growth-mindset and encourage input about what to try next to reach a more specifically outlined, achievable goal.

Content inspired by: Jackie Gnepp, Joshua Klayman, Ian O. Williamson, Sema Barlas, 2020. The future of feedback: Motivating performance improvement through future-focused feedback.

Where the science comes from: the field of organizational psychology (Jackie Gnepp, Ph.D.—of Humanly Possible).

March 4, 2020March 4, 2020

Because Love Breathes

There is an in and out of love. There is a rest and action. There is a pulsating rhythm to life and so it also goes with love. You can rest in that. You can explore what are your needs in the ebbs and floes of your own love experiences.

Healthy relationships are buttressed by healthy secure attachments. Aligning your actions to what promotes secure attachments is essential. Saying a proper hello and goodbye goes a very long way in fostering a trustworthiness that the relationship continues to be just as strong and secure even when we are not together, even as we inevitably come and go.

Building routine and ritual in the quintessential comings and goings can be one of the biggest challenges and victories for couples. Even parents must wrest with the daily greetings and goodbyes inevitable in raising our children. But what does it mean to create a ritual around relational breathing? Around the ho-hum daily rhythms of the couple, or if you have kids, the hive?

With intention, with consciousness, we create beauty. Whereas with mindlessness, havoc and chaos reign. We all want a beautiful life. Here’s how to set yourself up for having one.

Develop your hello and goodbye rituals.

It only takes a split-second to realize that we want to be greeted when we come home, and be wished well when we depart.

How this looks is as individual as we are.

Try identifying or dreaming up your idealized version of your everyday greeting of one another.

How do you greet one another? How do you come back together?

Now look at what you would most like to receive before leaving the ones that you love.

How do you depart from your beloved?

Take it a step further and extend the benefits of this exploration.

Anticipate your longings for the times when you and your partner are not together?

What do you need when you are away?

What does your partner need when away?

A warm hello and a pleasant goodbye not only impart fondness but also leave us with the sense that we are desired and a part of something greater than ourselves. No matter what upset may be lingering unprocessed, warmth and connective efforts go a long way to reducing relational stress and creating a sense of attachment security and safety.

In thinking back, what do you recall have been the most pleasant welcoming and departures? What would increase your sense of safety and connectedness in these simple yet powerful rituals?

March 4, 2020March 4, 2020

When was the last time you did something KIND for yourself?

Be honest here. Was it last month? Last week? Last night, this morning (A+)! Many of us unwittingly skip this agenda item burying it just under: ‘darn neighbor’s torn sock,’ in our most necessary to do list items. Not good.

Yet, not surprisingly, during the times when we most neglect our own self-care needs we often become yuck-ifyingly clingy, needy, and insufferable? …Your honesty is assumed here folks.

Okay, so we all know that self-care is an aspired-for, orienting habit. It grounds us, brings us delight in the present moment. Psychologists also know that it is the golden tool to bring a sense of self-agency (“I CAN do it!) moment for patients needing a proverbial kick in the pants or jumpstart to their engines. It’s true. When we feel at our lamest, when the earth is literally turning over on us, and we are consumed by a sense of powerlessness (the essential ingredient to depression), finding a single thing that we can do for ourselves that brings us joy may be the ticket out of the dark spiral of depressed being, or being-around, as it may be.

Now you may find yourself picking on the “brings us joy” comment. You may be saying that in a state of depression, joy is unattainable. And to that, I say, “perhaps” is the answer. And perhaps not! For clinical level depression, one should really seek and obtain professional help. But truthfully, in my experience, nearly all of my patients who (after encouragement to create their own rolodex of self-care recipes) actually used their rolodexes, made good progress.

Now a rolodex of self-care may need to be updated from time to time to accommodate changes to budget, age, seasons, and resources. All good. Simply add new cards and tag them with $, $$, $$$, $$$$ or time stamps for (5mins, 10mins, 1hour, 1/2 day, whole day, weekend, etc.,.

I encourage you do not lose motivation when your budget is on empty: whereas you might have once booked monthly (or, god bless you, weekly!) massage, now you may have to hit the amazon button and get one of those little scalp-claw devices (oooooh! So good!!!). Maybe you have to use it on yourself, but maybe you are fortunate to have a loved one commit to 4-5 minutes of such heaven-inducing relaxation while you mellow out or drink a spicy and revitalizing tea.

Whatever it is that tends to fill your bucket, write it down and store it away on your cloud-storage device under, “SELF-CARE”—so you can access it anywhere, anytime. PTSD Coach is an Amazing app that automatically populates your basic self-care protocols. It was designed to give you a boost if you lack the initiative or know-how in diy self-care kit.

I especially encourage my sleep-deprived mamas out there to dig deep into the recesses of their pre-baby brains and remember that at one time, they did do these kind of semi-routine things that brought them a sense of mastery or joy. Recalling this list is great, but for new mamas, it is really important to extract distilled versions of their previous joys; as 2-3 minutes is sometimes all you get! It’s ok! It will get better! For my pre-baby self, a 10-mile run brought great joy (especially if I set a new PR), but for me as a new mama, packing the kid in the carrier and dropping by the neighborhood coffee shop on a quick walk around the block brought me an equal amount of relief. And as ever, getting your shoes tied (or slip-ins, no judgment here) is often the hardest step in the whole inertia thing. Big ups for those whose joy is in overcoming Newton’s 1st law of motion on the regular—You are a Master!