Collective Thoughts

The world we live in is full of cycles. The school year starts around the same time and ends are the same time each year. The birds leave around the same time and come back around the same time. The leaves fall and the leaves grow back at the same time. We go to bed usually around the same time and get up around the same time. It goes without saying that there are parts of those cycles that we don’t enjoy. There are those of us that are morning people, some that are night owls. Some that love the winter, some who love the summer. Those who can dance in the rain and those who prefer to bathe in the sun. None of them are right or wrong, they just have their preference.

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The work we do in therapy sometimes revolves around unlearning some of the lessons we previously found in the stories we tell. One of the most prevalent stories I hear is the need to toughen up to get through life – the need for thicker skin. This story or lesson comes out of a multitude of situations – highly critical parents or family members, bullies in school, tough teachers, sometimes even hyper self-criticism. More often than not, no matter how it came about, the need for a thick skin tends to have its roots in hurt. The truth of the matter, however, is that if you’ve developed thick skin – you’ve become very good at not letting what people say hurt you or get in too deeply, but the converse of that is – it’s just as hard to let things come out from you.

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A good night of sleep is probably one of the best feelings in the world. Waking up, feeling refreshed and well-rested ­holds a special place as one of those amazing feelings we experience throughout life. As a parent it’s incredibly cute to get to see your baby wake up from a long night of sleep. I’d dare to say this isn’t just exclusive to humans. We’ve all seen videos of animals waking up and yawning or stretching. Whether it be a lion on the plains of Africa or your dog waking up on a weekend morning. That first stretch and big wide mouth yawn and shake/shutter – it’s kind of hard to beat. One of my personal favorites is also the ability and time to lay back down for an extra 15 minutes or so of good shuteye, what an amazing feeling. It’s resounding proof of how important rest is in our lives.

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We tend to see waiting as an inconvenience in our lives. What if it’s not an inconvenience, but actually a gift? Something special happens in the waiting, if even for a moment, you get to connect with your children and yourself in a way that just doesn’t happen normally.

We ultimately will get to the end of the line. We’ll reach our destination. We’ll say what parts we liked best or what surprised us and if we’d be willing to wait in line again for the same thing some other time. When it’s all said and done though, the stories we talk about will be the things that happened on the way to the destination, on the way to the attraction, on the way to the goal. As you go through your day, whether that be on vacation or not, perhaps joy lies in the waiting and in the journey, not just the goal or the destination. And when possible, be thankful for the gift of a long line.

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One of the hardest parts of grief and loss is continuing on with our lives after we’ve loss someone we’ve loved. We grapple with what life may look like now that they’re gone. We grapple with the grieving process. Most importantly, we grapple with how we feel, deal with and make sense of all of the emotions we’re experiencing.

There is no blueprint for grief. It looks different and feels different for everyone. That is in some ways the gift that it brings. It requires you to genuinely FEEL in your own way, not in what you’ve seen in others or even read about. Elizabeth Gilbert describes it this way.

Grief is a force of energy that cannot be controlled or predicted. It comes and goes on its own schedule. Grief does not obey your plans or your wishes. Grief will do whatever it wants to you, whenever it wants to. In that way, grief has a lot in common with love.

We grieve because we have loved. Grief only exist somewhere because there was once love there. I would dare to imagine that even though we experience grief, we would never choose to instead not have that joy we experienced in getting to know and love the person we loss. That love is the reason we miss them and the reason we grieve what we’ve loss.

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How do we prove our worth in this day and age?

I think I’d argue that some prove it through busyness. Nothing seems to show our worth or our importance more than telling someone how busy we are. It’s rare that someone is thought to be successful without it also being reflected by how ‘in-demand’ that person must be.

As we live if feels like it gets easier and easier for rest to become a byproduct – something we do ‘when we have time.’

Do we place equal importance on rest, as we do with busyness?

When we learn to prioritize rest as much as we prioritize busyness, then we can start to set ourselves up for optimal performance and a better life overall.

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If they had a choice, no one would want to be going through a difficult time. If they had a choice, no one would necessarily want to sit in that seat. When it comes to therapy, people typically are apprehensive, anxious and even hesitant to seek help for themselves. Those who choose to sit in THAT seat are the ones who are courageous. Those who choose to sit in THAT seat are the ones who are brave. The idea that ‘asking for help makes someone weak’ is an utter fallacy. Seeking help doesn’t mean weakness, actually means being stronger than those that don’t seek it. The strength comes in being willing to explore past the things on the surface. The strength comes in the vulnerability of admitting that everything is not ok. It truly is ok, not to be ok, despite what we may have been taught in our past.

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Growing up, who did you look to as a source of inspiration? Who was your hero? Looking back, was it a celebrity or sports figure, or perhaps more likely, it was someone you knew. Maybe it was a parent, or an Aunt or Uncle or another family member. Maybe it was a close friend or a teacher or possibly even the parent of one of your friends. No matter who they were, there were some people in your life growing up that influenced you.

Are we aware of the company we keep and how they influence our thoughts, emotions and our actions? Take inventory of those you spend your time with and how they influence you, but also how you influence those who choose to spend their time with you.

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Anxiety and nerves sometimes get a bad connotation in our society. We hear stories of the extremes and we sometimes forget that it’s actually quite natural to have these feelings. They are a part of being human. Another part of being human, though, is we have the ability to choose. The ability to choose to also give our attention to the possibility of success. To choose how much attention and power we give to our emotions. To choose where we intentionally focus our attention.

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A question I get often is, “Why did you name your practice North Collective?” It’s a good question and I love to talk about it. North is kind of self-explanatory given my location in Downtown Rochester. Where does the collective part come into play though? Well the Collective side of the name has been there from the beginning. I always knew it was going to be a part of the name but wasn’t sure in what manner. Thanks to a wonderful friend who helped me put it all together, North Collective Counseling sounded like a wonderful fit. Collective has been an idea in my mind since my undergrad days. What makes something a Collective experience?

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We don’t discount a child when they take their first steps, but it’s so much easier at times to discount ourselves when we do the same in life. We encourage children to take another step and another and before we know it, they don’t need encouragement, they’re just doing it because it’s become natural. It’s just what they do. Steps are a path to resilience. We don’t get where we’re hoping to go unless we keep taking steps and keep going.

The steps are what get us to the goal, but the steps are also what we look back on and talk about once we reach our goal.

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We’ve all heard the phrase before, “It goes without saying.” “It goes without saying, but I really appreciate you helping me out.” “It goes without saying, but I miss you.” “It goes without saying, but I love you.” “It goes without saying.”

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