Coping...
“If you are faced with a mountain, you have several options. You can climb it and cross to the other side. You can go around it. You can dig under it. You can fly over it. You can blow it up. You can ignore it and pretend it’s not there. You can turn around and go back the way you came. Or you can stay on the mountain and make it your home.”― Vera Nazarian
Are you just coping with life?
Are you seeing life happening around you and feeling disconnected?
Can you even remember a time when you thrived?
So many of my clients come to me after trying to cope with everything for so long it has become overwhelming.
They have spent so much time finding ways to shut down their anger, fight their cravings, suppress sadness and all sorts of other emotions. It takes up so much energy to control behaviours that they end up stressed out and feeling totally out of control.
I have often been the same and it becomes a cycle. We control, the overwhelm hits, in my case it was always illness or a flare of autoimmune disease, then a reset and back to the same behaviours.
This constant cycle put me on my backside more often than I can remember. Autoimmune disease was the thing crippled me but also that guided me out of them.
Coping strategies are a normal part of life. We all have our own ways of coping and we develop them early on to deal what feels unmanageable. Distraction, dissociation, scrolling, smoking, alcohol, binge watching and so on. They help us out for a while but they don’t resolve anything.
It’s a big step to accepting these behaviours as our patterns, as part of who we are, being kind enough to ourselves to become aware and not berate the ourselves for having them. At one time, they supported us, but now they don’t.
We do have other options than to step out occasionally and seek relief. It can feel daunting, but we do have the capacity to change.
We can become stronger, more resilient, embrace the difficult tasks that help us build a life that is less about treading water and more about surfing the waves.
There are steady and consistent steps to changing these patterns, they don’t happen over night and they certainly don’t happen by force or willpower.
Understanding the root of why we have these mechanisms in place is key to transformation.
Life took me to the places I needed to change. Illness and depression took a strong enough hold on me to seek the support I needed to build a more grounded sense of self.
Using IEMT, Root Cause Practice, Reiki and journalling over the years has uncovered deep layers of subconscious patterning and helped to create change in my life for the better and supported me to thrive.
For me trying to be constantly aware and seeing when and where I am slipping back. Building new routines and habits, engaging in life differently has been really helpful.
Am I always successful? No. But the task is to keep going, keep choosing yourself despite what the world tells you.
Some prompts to help you on your way:
Which habit am I choosing that keeps me feeling stuck and caught in a loop?
Can you remember the first time you used this to cope and why?
What habit, emotion or limiting belief sucks out my energy?
What emotion keeps me stuck and in overwhelm?
What tools and support do I need to change, transform and build healthier habits for my future that support me to thrive?
“It's funny: I always imagined when I was a kid that adults had some kind of inner toolbox full of shiny tools: the saw of discernment, the hammer of wisdom, the sandpaper of patience. But then when I grew up I found that life handed you these rusty bent old tools - friendships, prayer, conscience, honesty - and said 'do the best you can with these, they will have to do'. And mostly, against all odds, they do.” ― Anne Lamott