When you’re at the end of your emotional rope: Hang
on and Get Curious! By
Cathryn Bond Doyle
With everything that's going on in the world and in our own lives, there are times when we may feel like we're
about to “go crazy,” “lose it,” “give up” or “give in” and it's at these moments
of feeling at the end of our proverbial emotional rope that we make important choices.
What
do we do when we feel this way?
There are lots of ways to deal with this kind of stress. However there are basically 2 major categories of behavior.
-
Behavior that
helps us heal and regain our sense of strong, well-being
-
Behavior that
numbs the pain, causing us to deal with any consequences
at a later time.
Some strategies are healthy, bring us long-term results and are effective and productive. Others are not-so-healthy, help us only in the short-term and
can negatively impact others. Unfortunately sometimes these numbing strategies
also include eventual apologies, varying degrees of relationship damage control and/or “after the fact” feelings of guilt or self-punishment.
The purpose of this article is to offer insights and a positive self-care strategy for the next time you’re feeling overwhelmed, emotionally exhausted or have just plain “had enough!”
When we're under stress (or at the end of our ropes), we're often not at our best. Our
resources are often depleted, we're probably tired and we've been trying our best. We may even
feel out of control or unfairly impacted by events and situations.
Whether we're conscious of them or not, we all have survival strategies for these situations. When we're not
feeling in tip-top shape the natural tendency is to resort to anything that'll make
us feel less pain.
This is where the allure of numbing strategies
becomes appealing or occurs automatically, like a reflex action. Before we go on to talk about the new ways of behavior, let’s
talk about some common numbing strategies.
Numbing
strategies are popular, plentiful and punishing.
There are many ways to numb our
feelings. They can take the form of artificial substances (we already know a lot about them.)
There are mechanical ones, like working or playing so much that we neglect - deny- ignore our responsibilities.
There are also emotional numbing strategies. Of
the 3 mentioned, emotional numbing seems to be generally less understood.
Emotional numbing strategies are
designed to stop us from feeling our real feelings by giving us something else to think about and feel. They're designed to distract us from our true feelings therefore having the effect of numbing or seemingly ending our initial pain.
Common examples of these numbing strategies
are becoming controlling (the subject of several other articles) and feelings of blame, guilt, self-pity and righteous anger.
Although these feelings aren't very much fun; they're familiar, instant, legal, we’re quite good at them and they're comparatively less threatening to us than the feelings we're trying to avoid.
To blame or not to blame: That's the responsible question.
Probably the most popular numbing strategy
is blaming. Many of us will rush to quickly figure out who or what we can blame, as soon as we begin to feel emotional pain.
Duh! It makes perfect sense. It feels a lot better to blame someone ELSE for our problems than it does to admit we had something to do with our own troubles.
It feels much better to make someone ELSE bad and wrong, than to admit to ourselves, “Oh my, maybe this
is my issue and my responsibility not someone else’s.”
Blaming another for our pain can make us feel “better than” someone else. Our judgments of right and wrong will indeed numb our pain but they won’t fix the problem, heal our wounds or get us any closer to feeling better.
If we’re willing to act like adults (not children),
take responsibility (vs. blame) and grow up from past wounds and childhood issues and if we’re brutally honest with ourselves, we’ll see that blaming usually creates more problems and delays constructive and long-term solutions.
When we can recognize and admit that we're blaming to numb our pain, we can stop this behavior, have some compassion for ourselves and try something new. We can begin to focus on taking care of ourselves. There’s an idea worthy of our time and attention.
First things first: Self-care, an essential goal!
Remember when the airlines first came out with that line: “Please get your oxygen mask on first and then
help those around you.” Initially some people felt that was a selfish action but it’s now a well accepted view that we're better able to care for others once we have taken care of ourselves.
This concept clearly applies when we're stressed and upset. By making effective self-care a priority in times of high stress, we help ourselves and anyone else with whom we interact.
If we can agree that self-care is the avenue of choice that we want to take positive, non-punishing, non-numbing actions, then what do we do the next time we feel upset
and stressed out?
The first thing to do is STOP! Pause! Consciously resist old habits. Stop ourselves
from taking any actions long enough to ask ourselves some valuable questions and give ourselves the space and time to come up with some meaningful answers.
Get curious about our own needs!
Just do this one step and be amazed at the changes and the wisdom that surfaces. This could be uncomfortable at first. The discomfort is due to lack of practice, that’s all.
Questions to interrupt
old patterns and lead to “happier endings”:
What
do I need, right now, to feel better?
What
can I do, this very minute, to help myself?
-
Take
a break?
-
Step
out for some air?
-
Take
a bath?
-
Call
a friend?
-
-
Try
something new?
-
-
-
Stand
up for myself?
What,
in this situation, do I have the ability to control?
As we learn more effective ways to deal with our lives and the situations we face, we're taking better care of ourselves and this can reduce the day-to-day stress.
With less stress, we handle things with more ease and consequently minimize the “end of our rope”
moments. By taking the time to get curious, we can develop a unique and personal strategy that improves our ability to handle whatever
life offers us.
We can learn to do this without controlling anyone else, without needing anyone else to change and without temporarily numbing our feelings, knowing at some level we’ll have to deal with them eventually.
Please note:
Blame will always be a choice. Numbing will always be an option.
However, as you get to experience the joy of creative problem solving and you begin to feel your personal power and your self-confidence soar as you take charge of solving any stressful situations that arise, you’re likely to get hooked on this new strategy.
It’s quite
wonderful to realize that your day's no longer at the mercy of “incoming stress.”
You’ll probably startle those around you, who expect old behaviors from you, but what a joy for all to experience your new strategies. You’ll probably also inspire those around you and that’s a great feeling as well.
So remember, next time you feel like you're at the end of your emotional rope…hang on, get curious and show yourself your own talents and competence. Good Luck.
You're going to be changing life habits so give yourself a little time and be patient with yourself.
©2001 Cathryn Bond Doyle. All Rights
Reserved.
