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Monday, May 27, 2013

Negative Emotions? STOP!

Do you find yourself getting caught up in unpleasant emotions or feelings more than you'd like? Are you ready to move past them, or better yet through them in order to heal? OK then, STOP! I know what you're thinking, easier said than done. STOP is a favorite technique I learned in the teachings of Deepak Chopra. First, I'll explain how to STOP, and then I'll give you a little bit of a background on how it works.

S- Literally means stop, or in other words, take a moment to pause and
T- Take 3 deep breaths.
O- Observe what chemical reactions are going on in your body. Then,
P- Proceed in a positive direction.

It's important to stay in a place of non-judgement with yourself during this process. There can be no negative self-talk about the feelings you are experiencing. Accept them. You're human. When dealing with my depression and bouts of self harm, I learned that we are constantly creating our experiences. Our current emotions are not what we will attract in the future, they are an expression of what we are attracting right now. When we perceive negative emotion, it is a symptom of resistance in the flow of our life force and creating what we want. In other words, we are buying into thoughts that are not true to our core being.

How does this relate to us biologically?

The brain is comprised of tiny nerve cells called neurons. These neurons have itty-bitty branches that reach
Neural network
out and connect to other neurons to form a neural network. A thought or memory is held in each place where these neurons connect. Nerve cells that fire together wire together. If you practice something over and over, those nerve cells have a long-term relationship. If you get angry, suffer, or give into perceptions of victimization, you are rewiring and reintegrating that neural net on a daily basis. Ideas, thoughts, and feelings are all constructed and interconnected in this neural net, and all have possible relationships with one another. Any information we consume from our environment is colored by our collective experiences and level of awareness.

Nerve cells that do not fire together, no longer wire together. They lose their long-term relationship each time we interrupt the thought process that produces a chemical response in the body. When we start interrupting and “Observing” the effects it takes, we are no longer the emotional person that is responding to our environment in an automatic or irrational way. Those nerve cells that are connected start breaking their long-term association, and re-associating according to how we “Proceed”. So stay positive, and create new long-term associations that make you happy!

An example I can give is with the concept of love, which is stored within this vast neural network in the brain. We build the concept of love from many different ideas. By adulthood, most of us have had our glitches along the way and are operating in an emotionally detached place, as if today were yesterday. We are not operating as an integrated whole, and have transgressed to an earlier time when we are operating from an emotionally reactive place or in a state of disconnection. When I was at my lowest,
memories in neural network
I connected love to disappointment. When I thought about love, I practiced the memories of pain, sorrow, anger and even rage over my relationship that was falling apart. My rage was linked to hurt, which was linked to my ex, which then connected back to the emotion of love. Add to this the information I had stored from other adventures in life, and I had refined and built a reality based on how I saw the world outside of myself. The cycle kept repeating itself.

neuropeptide

Why do we get stuck in these ceaseless cycles? Our bodies are protein producing machines. In the hypothalamus, we make small-chain proteins called peptides, and assemble them into neuropeptides or neurohormones that match emotional states that we experience on a daily basis. There are chemicals for anger, sadness, victimization, lust, joy, and love. There is a chemical that matches every emotional state, and when we experience an emotional state in our body, the hypothalamus will unhesitatingly assemble its peptide and then release it through the pituitary gland and into the bloodstream. The moment it makes it into the bloodstream, it makes its way to any number of different parts in the body.

Receptors on a cell
Along the outside of each cell are receptor sites that are receivers for incoming information. This alchemy causes biochemical events which can change the actual nucleus of the cell. Then cells reproduce based on this cellular memory. This begs us to ask,  “Are some emotions good or bad?” Emotions are designed to chemically strengthen the things we have put into our long-term memory. That is why we have them, they illuminate the brilliance of our existence. It is our addiction to our emotions that is the real problem. One of the most important things we need to remember when we are addicted to emotions that are destructive in nature is that it is not just psychological, it’s biochemical as well. 

Think about this: heroin uses the same receptor equipage on the cells that our emotional chemicals use. If we can be addicted to heroin, we most certainly be addicted to emotion.

So who is in the driver’s seat when we respond to our emotions? We are. We are not our thoughts that spark our theatrics. I can show you this in a very simple way. Think of an apple, now think of a triangle, and finally think of the happiest day you've ever had. You are no more that apple or triangle than you the negative things you believe about yourself or your life when you fall prey to turmoil. (As I type this, I look up at the TV and see children bobbing for apples. I love synchronicity!)

I believe the mind/body correlation is incredibly important. So the next time you find yourself in negative excitement, pause for a couple moments to take a couple deep breaths, and observe what is chemically happening in your body. For example, Are you feeling anger? Jealousy? Disappointment? Where is it located in your body? How are you experiencing it? Is it a ball in the pit of your stomach? What is it doing to your heart? After accepting that you are experiencing the emotion in a state of non-judgement, proceed positively! What's positive? It is anything constructive that will build you up. What did I do? When I thought of love and the feelings of depression would set in, I would stop and think of my Grama Betty singing You Are My Sunshine to me. That always brings a smile to my heart. I know that if I can do this, you can too. Go ahead and STOP already!


In Love <3  

Thursday, May 16, 2013

Suicide: I'm Still Breathing!



I've tried to start writing this blog about a hundred different ways, and none of them have felt appropriate. The subject I'm going to talk about is deep and emotional for those affected. It's not easy to talk about, but the alarming statistics of suicide in the United States shows a larger societal problem that cannot be ignored. In 2010, almost 40,000 people could no longer bear their perceived burden and opted for suicide as their answer, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). (http://rt.com/usa/us-suicides-crisis-cdc-report-761/) The report also indicated a 30% increase in adults aged 35-64. The US Department of Veterans Affairs released a report (http://www.va.gov/opa/pressrel/pressrelease.cfm?id=2427) in February indicating that one vetaran takes their life every 65 seconds. The CDC also marks that one in twelve teenagers have attempted suicide. This subject is close to my heart so when I saw the "I'm Still Breathing" awareness campaign on Facebook, I knew I had to take part. My grandfather committed suicide in 1977, we lost a childhood friend to suicide in high school, and I was hospitalized for attempted suicide in 2005.

Some of our biggest lessons comes through the darkest hours of the soul, when we can barely hold on by our fingernails, tasting only our blood, sweat, and tears. Many people get stuck in this abyss, not realizing that they have already won the battle. When we find ourselves in the midst of chaos, peace seems to feel the furthest away. We must realize that if we can start to build a solid foundation in the midst of the pandemonium, what we will experience when we come out on the other side will be the exaltation of grace and joy. It's never easy, but it's always worth it. All that is required is a decision, and luckily, there are no wrong decisions. We are exactly where we need to be!



At our very core we are all connected. We all want to love and be loved, to feel happy, healthy, and secure. We all laugh or cry in the same language, and we all bleed the same color. Many people disagree with this notion, but I truly believe that everyone operates from love in their own level of consciousness, and if we could just take the time to see each other as kin, there would be no way we would want to hurt someone else, let alone kill them. This is one of the first important steps we must take in making peace.

It's easy to get caught up in the melodrama and back and forth, but one thing I have learned from it... hate begets hate, violence begets violence, negativity begets negativity, and love begets love. It's when we truly remove ourselves from the drama, and not allow ourselves to be caught up in the menial back and forth that we can find release.

I encourage you all today to walk away from the nonsensical. People are going to attempt to tell you who you 
can and can't be. They will set expectations that even they can't live up to themselves. They will talk about you, and if you are doing something right, they will judge and criticize you! Let me tell you right now, if anything they say is not based in pure love, don't you dare listen to them or believe what they are saying, not even for a second!! Let's take it a step further, if what you say to yourself is not based in pure love, you are lying to yourself! You are beautiful. You are magnificent, and you are perfect, just the way you are!!



If you are struggling with depression and thoughts of suicide, please reach out for help. It gets better! Believe me, I'm still breathing!  





Facebook page for group with I'm Still Breathing pictures: https://www.facebook.com/selfharm.supportpage

**The number to the National Suicide Prevention hotline is 1-800-273-TALK (8255)

Sunday, May 12, 2013

Happy Mother's Day!



Hello and Happy Mother's Day! I hope this blog finds you blessed with happiness! We are alive, and that is reason to be happy in and of itself! This is just a short post to check in and try to get back into the habit of writing. I'm undergoing so many changes right now, and I find having a way to creatively express myself can help give me perspective. Besides, today has been a heck of a day and I have a message to get out there, but I'll get to that later. 

Mom and Grama Betty before lunch!
I was able to visit with mom and grandma Betty, and we hit up our favorite spot to eat in town, Castiglia's. It was great spending time with them, just hanging out. We take for granted so much of the time that passes by. Days can turn into weeks, and weeks into months. Then we find ourselves wishing for just one more day. I can remember as if it were yesterday, my sister, Nicki, and I were kids and all of the excitement around Mother's Day. We'd wake up early to prepare breakfast, trying to not awaken mom. It was so exciting! Now Nicki is in GA, with two of her own, and breakfast has turned into lunch. Thank goodness for lunch! 

On the way to Keyser, I almost made a huge boo boo. Driving through Cumberland, I'm having a moment in losing my zen, which is never good for me, but my estranged husband is sitting in the car next to me and I'm thankful he's letting me borrow the car so I can go see my family, but I'm frustrated as hell. I need a car! I'm on Centre St. at the stop sign, looking left and pull forward. SHIT! STOP!!! A car. I'm not on Centre at all, I'm on Liberty and almost hit this poor woman and a car full of people because I was looking the wrong way. My heart is pounding, and I'm shocked. Obscenities start flying out of her mouth. I didn't even have a chance to say I'm sorry before she flew off! For some reason, my zen totally pops in and I can't even get mad and scream back at her. All I could think to do was blow her a kiss, and that was not well received. (I promise lady, I'm not really an asshole!) At that point all I could do was laugh at the absurdity of it all. So here is my message, just in case it gets out there, and you know who you are :)  Look lady, I really just wanted to get to my mom and Grama. I'm sorry I almost hit you, but thank goodness I didn't. I would've said I'm sorry if you didn't fly off the hook so fast. I hope you weren't angry for too long. 

This has been my daily reminder that when squeezed or put under pressure, your reaction shows you what you are made of.