One more year: Wholeheartedly Choosing Myself
"Treat your body like you would a daughter" and other lessons: On Mindful Breathing, the Tree in Narrative Therapy and Moving On.
Today marks my 27th spin around the Sun, in other words - it is my birthday.
27 lessons.
3 gifts.
Vamos!
27:
Treat your body like you would a daughter.
I have gained even when I have lost.
Loss does not dilute my heart and my Being, it expands them.
Time is a great healer - it flows at its own accord and my body is the compass guiding me through the lessons.
My parents are human, too, why did I expect them to be without flaws? Forgiveness is rooted in this sentence.
Healing means becoming the person who could have saved Kit Katrin.
I am a carrier of compassion and I choose to give it, first and foremost, to myself.
My self-worth should never be dependent on a number or a person. It is my Self’s worth and My Self is complex, so why try and fit one box only when so many adjectives and nouns describe me?
I get rubber and erase the boxes others put me in and the boxes I put myself in.
Numbers quantify, so I no longer use them to quantify my quality.
Take deep breaths.
Did you know that smokers mistake that a cigarette calms them down, in fact - it is their deep inhale and conscious exhale. The cigarette just might be the only time they take a mindful breath.
Dump the “fault” word: it was not my fault, I take the lesson, I listen to myself and I move on.
Actions > Chaotic overthinking.
I ask myself, If your problem was completely solved, how would your life be different?
I think about action steps instead of analysing a problem over and over,
and getting more and more lost in the possible ‘solutions’.
I put effort into getting my own dopamine dose daily. Dance, walk, deep work, meditate or exercise, savour the moment, leave my phone once in a while, and do new things.
I am a channel for unique expression. I compare myself to Yesterday Katrin only.
I feel more.
My nervous system knows how to survive, it is my duty to myself to teach it how to thrive.
My energy is a gift not a given.
I have a say in what I am around and I choose not to be around what I had to heal from.
I love myself in my rawness: when I dance in the kitchen, when I cry over a book, when I stumble on a straight road, when I catch a sunset and tear up, when I fail to commit to myself but choose compassion over criticism.
I choose compassion over criticism. I can always do that.
I drop the easy fixes and short-lived stimulation.
I say one good thing to one person every day: everyone deserves to be acknowledged so I am an empowerer.
I am not getting rid of my fear, I move despite it in the same way that I acknowledge that self-doubt is part of the process of self-trust.
I surround myself with people who add to my life instead of hoping that this person will fix a void in me, or I will fix a void in them.
I know that a full-hearted “no” is better than a half-hearted “yes”. Always.
Mental health is for small, daily wins that I cheer myself through.
I move on with clarity, awareness, gentleness, intentionality, inner strength, self-compassion, and confidence.
I know that Time Passes: when something good happens to me, I am grateful because time passes; when something bad happens to me, I hold the lessons tight and I am patient, time passes.
3 FOR YOU:
Present 1: The Breath That Reset Me.
S. T. O. P.
Stop literally. Stop moving. Step away from your task. Freeze in space.
Take a deep breath. Inhale for 5 seconds. Pause at the top of your breath. Exhale for 5 seconds. Focus only on breathing. Adjust the seconds: allocate the same time for an exhale as you do for an inhale. (Courtesy of my yoga instructor.)
Observe. What surrounds you? What do you carry in you? Pay attention to any unease you are experiencing in your body. Do a head-to-toe scan. What emotions are you feeling? Give them a name.
Proceed with Purpose. What do you need right now? What is going to serve you right now? What can you control right now? What is realistically measurable right now?
Decide what serves your best interest right now and proceed with purpose.
I kindly remind you that breathwork can be hard to achieve for a nervous system with unprocessed trauma so be kind to yourself, be patient with your body.
Present 2: The Book That Reset My Mindset.
It won’t be me if I don’t offer you a book.
What makes us human?
The back of the book says that it is about thirty-nine women in a cage. The 40th - the youngest, nameless narrative engineer - tells you the story, her story, her life of never knowing men, of solitude and of loss. Loss of something you have never had.
Um, terribly incomplete.
“The Child”, the Woman is breathtakingly human without knowing much about humanity.
In less than 200 pages, the Child teaches us about “the familiarity of the cage” and “the extraordinary of the ordinary”.
It is untouched and touching, extraordinary and ordinary, terrifying and heartwarming, curious and resigned, controlled and untamed, caged and free.
I kindly force you to read it.
Present 3: The Pen That Reminded.
I found The Tree of Life technique, belonging to the field of Narrative Therapy, several weeks ago.
Well, it found me.
Grab a torch.
I kindly suggest you pick a silent spot.
I kindly suggest you to listen.
I kindly suggest you to be kind.
Draw a tree with branches, leaves, fruit, trunk, and roots.
Ground it. The ground is your Present. Write on the area of the ground how you commit or want to commit to yourself every day. What acts will show you the love you carry for yourself?
Root it. Where do you come from? What do you come from? In between the roots you drew, write random words that come to mind for your past. (I even wrote “teddy bear” and drew my favourite teddy bear with a sweatshirt that had holes for his ears.)
Stabilise it. In the trunk, write your passions - anything and everything that lights you up.
Remember that motivation is external, inspiration - internal. Tune in with the latter.
Branch out to your hopes, dreams and wishes. Every branch you draw has to carry what you want your future to look like.
Let the fruits remind you of the gifts you have received. Each fruit you drew has to carry the love, kindness and support you have received. Write these gifts next to every fruit.
Don’t forget the people in your life who brought them - write the names of the most important people in your life in the leaves - whether they are physically present here and now or not.
Take a deep breath and draw a little whirlpool on the left: these are the storms. The storms that were brought to you by challenges, losses, lack of resources and stressful situations. Write without thinking too much.
Hold that pencil compassionately.
Holding myself compassionately in the next spin,
Katrin