My 21 greatest teachers, favorite things and biggest lessons from 2021: Part II
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Happy Sunday, Soothers. Following up on my first installment from last week's post, here are the next 7 on the list of my 21 teachers, favorite things, and biggest lessons from 2021. You can read last week's post here, and I'll have one more installment coming next week, before taking a break from this here Soother for a month or so.
If you're looking for guidance to take into 2022, may I recommend this bundle I put together for you? It's called An Authentic + Intuitive Year, $75, and it includes three things:
My 31 Journal Prompts for Self-Discovery ebook
A training on Anxiety vs. Intuition
And a training on how to reflect on your past year and set the vision for the year ahead in order to set meaningful, authentic goals
You can also get just the year-ahead goal-setting workshop on its own here for $39.
Wishing you a gentle start to 2022, and let's dive in:
8. What is this an invitation into or an opportunity for? Probably the thing I've said the most in the past year or two is that the quality of your questions is going to reflect the quality of your life. This. question is one I use ALL THE TIME: What is this an invitation into or opportunity for? I've used it on everything of the question around Death (my #1 biggest teacher this year), to changed plans, to the most mundane things in the world, like a couple of weeks ago when we were out to a dinner and the waitress didn't take our order for 30 minutes (the best I could come up with it was an invitation into better observing my thoughts and also compassion for her). I genuinely believe with all my heart that with every experience in life, we are being asked to grow or expand or love bigger in some way. Asking myself this question over and over again in 2021, particularly in my most challenging or frustrating moments, taught me the power of being open and curious. Try it on in 2022.
9. Healing happens in spirals, like, really actually. I always see quotes on Instagram like "healing isn't linear" and I was like yeah yeah I mean it's important to SAY that but actually... it's linear, right?? And I'm failing when I'm not doing it linearly?!?!? This was the year I learned that indeed, no, healing is spiralic rather than linear. You rarely fully heal an issue, you just heal one layer of it and then at a future point you will be invited to address and maybe heal it at a deeper level and then it will happen dozens of times again. One of my biggest wounds is of being hyper productive and leading myself to the edge of burnout over and over again. This happened again probably 2 or 3 times again this year. At first I was disappointed, I thought I had made great strides on this in 2020. But no, this is a deep wound. And, I did notice, I caught myself going into this pattern earlier and earlier each time. My healing spiral around burnout/working too much continues. I now acknowledge and welcome it, and only hope that with each time it occurs I can notice and release it with gentleness perhaps maybe 5% earlier each time.
10. Leaning into intense curiosity about my biggest triggers: Perhaps related to the above two, this year was really the first I was able to maintain an extreme curiosity about my biggest triggers rather than immediately react to them. What this looked like for me: Somebody would trigger the shit out of me (a loved one, somebody on the internet, a politician, whoever). I would notice all the sensations in my body and when I could get to it, write down all the thoughts I was having. I would NOT react from the trigger in the moment, for once in my life. I kept journaling and feeling into sensations in my body and asking, why, why, why? Not why like, WHY DOES THIS KEEP HAPPENING GOD SAVE ME but more like, "Why would this make sense that this is super triggering for me?" When I felt the trigger just about wanting to make me explode, I would walk outside, go to a bathroom and do shaking or deep breathing. Until I could understand it, I decided, I would not act from it. This curiosity served me so beautifully this year. I get triggered so much less often and I know it means I am healing old wounds that were basically running my life beforehand. Stay gentle and curious around your triggers, friends. Why would it make sense that you would be activated by a given situation?
11. Focusing and somatic healing work: I've written before about the modality of Focusing and parts work and I've continued to do them as well as somatic experiencing type work to great effect. These approaches get you into your body and your true internal words in a way I don't think talk therapy ever could. If you're intrigued I really recommend you begin by reading some of Richard Schwartz's or Ann Weiser Cornell's work on Internal Family Systems (Schwartz) or Focusing (Cornell). Absent that, when you're feeling some sort of way and in a loop in your head about it, try this: Name where you feel this experience in your body. Describe the sensation. What does it feel like? Does the sensation have a color? A texture? A shape? A temperature? What message does it have for you? And voila, you're doing some somatic work.
12. Continuing on deeper shadow work and inner child work. Shadow work and inner child work are two of my faaaaavorite things, they are the most magical breadcrumbs back to healing and wholeness. Shadow work is learning to embrace and integrate the rejected parts of yourself you've tucked away and shamed. Inner child work is going back in time to a young version of yourself who is caught in a wounding and needs you to stand up for them to get them out of there. They are abstract concepts but very powerful when you can ground them and do them. If you're interested in inner child work, try out the book Healing Your Lost Inner Child by Robert Jackman. The bulk of the shadow work I did this year was through my excellent, wise and compassionate coach Nida Backaitis, and she uses a self-discovery process called The Wisdom Way by Alaya Chadwick. I haven't read it yet but I believe Chadwick documents her shadow work process in her book here.
13. Becoming fluent in my nervous system and grounding it. This was the year I dedicated to grounding my nervous system as much I could. I did so much research and study on this work and actually applied it to my life. I did conscious breathing almost every day. I tried to earth in nature as much as possible. I became fluent in what states my nervous system would default to and what would generally trigger them or bring myself back to safety. I strengthened my Vagus Nerve. As I talked about earlier, I cut out caffeine. If you're interested in doing this work yourself, try out Sukie Baxter's YouTube channel for some simple exercises or read the work of Deb Dana, those are both great starting points.
14. I considered if I was ADHD or even ASD this year. There's no doubt in my mind after doing a lot of reading and exploring this year that I have ADHD, though I don't have a formal diagnosis or plan to get one or to get any medication. Is it inherent? Is it from trauma? Is just because, you know, phones and COVID and capitalism? I'm not sure, and I don't think it matters, but it's definitely here for me. Why is this great? Self compassion and self understanding. If I can reduce shame around the fact that a lot of the way we're taught to do and be doesn't work for me, and fully embrace and trust what does work for me, that helps me heal and change. As for autism, I have wondered if I have Autism Spectrum Disorder too, especially after reading Katherine May's memoir, The Electricity of Every Living Thing. I know also that many in the autism community believe that high sensitivity is how autism can present in women, from what I understand. Is this possible too? Is it "real" for me? I'm not sure and I also don't plan on getting a diagnosis here either, just continuing to read and understand neurodivergency in all forms. I do know deeply that people with ADHD or ASD can experience some significant shame because they felt or acted very differently in childhood and were shamed for that, and if I'm an expert on anything, I think it's shame. So if you can find compassion for yourself in any labels, diagnosis, or general better understanding of what may be going on in your heart, body, mind and soul, I wish that for you too, in the way understanding my neurodivergent brain has given me deep self-compassion and acceptance.