Gators đ have evolved for optimal efficiency. They do not waste time or  energy on pursuits that will deplete versus fuel them unless the benefit of such pursuit is deemed worthy. In fact, gators lurk below the surface monitoring for opportunities (will this help me?) and threats (will this harm me?) and simply appear to ignore everything else.Â
As tasty morsels come into the gators path the only ones that prompt a response are the ones worthy of their chomp.
In life, humans have the appearance of their own tasty morsel experiences that come along their path. Before deciding to chomp, there is exists a space between the experience and our response where we have the opportunity to ask âwill this harm me?â or âwill this help me?â
When humans learn how to stay in the present and mindfully respond they are able to reap the rewards with an intentional life.
If worthy of the chomp then take action and enjoy! If not worthy of the chomp then deploy the tools of chosen response, see if there is anything worth pursuing, process it out, and remain in the fierceness of the zen-like state of being a gator đ
When you find yourself upset by a situation or person, ask yourself if the thoughts, feelings, or actions from the situation or person is yours to carry.
With this, it could be helpful to visualize a bag (or an assortment of bags) during these times.
Observe the bagâitâs shape, itâs color, itâs size, itâs contents, itâs weightâand decide whether you wish to pick it up and hold itâŚor not.
This comes with the parallel awareness and realization thatâlike airport baggage/luggageâwe can only carry/handle so much before being bogged down and overall the contents of the bags preventing us from getting to our gates and ultimately to our desired destination within the optimal experience (i.e., the destination that is aligned with our life values and goals).
A question to ask as you approach a new bagâŚis this mine to carry? Is this something I choose to carry?
Urge surfing can be used with any urges (e.g., urges to avoid, escape, or push away unwanted emotions, urges within procrastination, urges to isolate, urges to self-harm) you experience, including action urges of emotions that don’t serve us well.
Emotions also serve a purpose. Similar to when our stomachs rumble to signal hunger, emotions signal us of a greater need. With this, we can have the urge to run from the action urge of anxiety or grief /loss because of the discomfort of the experience. If we can learn to sit with the emotion, be curious, and identify what it is trying to communicate to usâŚwe can, in turn, take positive action within it and ultimately respond mindfully (versus react) to its signal. When we are able to do this, the strength of the wave is diminished.
To Urge Surf, visualize urges rising and falling like waves. Rather than trying to fight against the wave and be tossed and turned upside down, practice the skill of noticing and observing then surfing the wave until it’s lost it’s power.
Each urge has 3 stages:
RISE WITH INTENSITY
The rise of intensity is when the urge is triggered or begins building up. This is when, if we are able to notice and name what is happening (pay attention non-judgmentally to the sensations that are occurring for us). We can be curious and open to this experience and choose in that moment to not fight against it. We can also deploy our learned coping /mindfulness strategies (breath work, grounding, engage our 6 sensations of sight, smell, touch, taste, hearing plus movement) so that the wave does not grow as big.
THE PEAK
2) The peak is the point the urge is the strongest, like the white caps of the crest of the wave as it peaks. It is slightly before this that we must choose whether to surf and ride the wave or be taken down by it. If we choose to ride, we can continue to take deep mindful breaths as we ride our surfboard. This stage can last up to 20 minutes.
THE CRASH
3) The crash starts when the urge begins to lessen, like a wave after it has peaked and starts falling back into the ocean and towards the reclaimed calm.
We can often become anxious in anticipation of the future or sad about the past. It can be helpful when we are able to live in the present.
If this sounds like you, the following activity may be useful. If you would like to try it out, write âfutureâ on a piece of paper. Under âfutureâ write âpresentâ and under âpresentâ write âpast.â
When you feel caught up in thoughts or emotions, slide/move your finger up or down the page to determine where you are. Are you in the past, present, or future?
After a few times you can move the written out page to a visual in your mind. This can be a useful strategy as you move about your day in order to determine your current mindset. If you find you are in the future or past, you can then ask yourself what you may be able to do to move back to the present. This is an intentionally lived and mindful life, a life within the present.
As we stand on the welcome mat of 2021 and prepare to enter its door, I find myself reminiscing. Who knew when my family arrived back in Cali in October 2019 that we were headed into a worldwide global pandemic that would cause massive societal shifts that have come to change the way we live.
2020 what a year! It is said, âWhen patterns are broken, new worlds emerge.â âTuli Kupferberg
As I reflect, this is where my thoughts drift this morning and where I am able to take some solace amongst the continued uncertainties of this virus. Uncertainty and change is no stranger to me. The trick is to remember the blessings amongst the chaos and not get so caught up in it all that we forget to live. The virus has already stolen so much from us but what has it given us? How has it forced us to evolve and embrace what is important in life?
Vernon Law says it well, âExperience is a hard teacher because she gives the test first, the lesson afterward.â
The surrealâness of it all. Benjamin Disraeli said, âChange is inevitable. Change is constant.â
I have lived this life of change and unpredictability before. In response to quick turnaround military orders, I recall the night before my families big move to Italy at the end of 2018 wherein we packed up 4 kids and 3 dogs and moved across the ocean. The true challenge of this change, the absolute blessings from embracing and moving within it. It changed us in ways we could never have imaginedâdespite the difficulties of a massive move, uprooting our kids, adapting within an unknown cultureâ we persevered as we soaked up the history, the culture, the food experiences. While there were many blessings, there were also true challenges within this growth-producing experience. We gathered a true multitude of memories from our time abroad as we were given the opportunity to travel all over Europe. We drove the crazy no rules roads in Italy, dived into various cultures and languages, walked the streets of Rome, ventured to Pompeii, white water rafted in Austria, ate yummy pastries in Bologna and huge (size of your face) homemade pretzels in Germany, went to Shakespeareâs Globe in London, plus so much more. We took the fear of this move and travel alongside us and did not let it hold us back. Now that we are nestled back in Southern California, these experiences are ones we continue to treasure.
I find myself thinking, what if we had not embraced the challenge and converted it to opportunities? What if I had let fear hold me back?
After all, âThe art of life lies in a constant readjustment to our surroundings.â âKakuzĹ Okakura, The Book of Tea
When we remember the blessings amongst the chaos we get to live fullyâeven in the midst of a global pandemic.
When we build a campfire, does it burn eternally? Do we build it once and never tend to it again? No, of course not, similar to our devotion of creating a rich, full, and meaningful life, we have to tend to that campfire every single day to keep the flames burning. Life is similar, we have goals we are striving for, obstacles we face, and things we must put into action to keep our flames blazing. This may include stepping back and assessing the campfire several times a day to add new logs to the campfire and generate new sparks and/ or maintain the everlasting campfire (i.e., a rich, full, and meaningful life). Of course, within balance, once we have a strong campfire built, life is also about just being and enjoying the warmth of the campfire you have built, adoring the dance of the red, orange, and yellow flames, throwing a new log on occasionally to keep the spark alive, and remembering life is not a destination, it is a journey…sometimes a journey that takes many logs being added to our campfire. Live the intentional life, a life full of campfires.
It may be difficult to see your way to shore amongst the storms of life.
While you may not need someone to row the boat for you, it can often be helpful for another to shine the light onto the path towards a rich, full, and meaningful life.
Providing a safe harbor for my clients to seek refuge and safety from the storms of life.
Part of being human is the experience of emotion. Emotions serve to communicate to us when things are going well and not so well so that we may formulate a response. With this, the feeling of numbness may be something everyone experiences from time to timeâfrom feeling overwhelmed by a life stressor to some form of trauma. Typically the feeling is temporary and allows us mental and emotional processes of shutting out feelings in order to move through something difficult. However, for some, this feeling of emotional numbness can linger for a durationâoften serving as a protective defense that guards us from further emotional or physical pain. While this shield of numbness can serve us well in the short-term, such as to get through a life stressor; when it stays for a duration, it can have long-lasting consequences such as the inability to problem solve, experience pleasure and other positive emotions, engage in life, and be the whole person we can choose to be.
Numbness can show up differently for each person. The cause could be wide such as symptoms associated with PTSD, Grief/ Loss, Depression, Anxiety, Abuse/ Neglect, and/ or a whole array of past life experiences that have now come to haunt your present. When feelings of numbness linger or stay for the duration and exceed our ability to cope, it may be time to consult a mental health professional to support in unpacking and processing within the causation of the emotional numbness.
Treatment may include a Therapist (such as myself) who specializes in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Trauma Work, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), Mindfulness, Solution-Focused Brief Therapy (SFBT), and other treatment approaches.
I am a Therapist who travels between California and Europe. In my time here on Earth, I have been blessed to live all across the United States; making a home in almost every corner (coast to coast) and some in between. One day, as a Marriage and Family Therapist, as I sat and counseled my clients, as I had so often did, to live their life to the fullest, to seize the day (carpe diem), and to have no regrets, I found myself intrigued by my words in a new way. That night, on my drive home, I wondered was I taking my own advice? Had I lost site of living within my guiding principles? Sure I had a great life but was I living my life fully or stuck in my comfort zone? So, when international travel came calling, I had to answer. I transferred my private practice to fully online and set out to live the life I wished so dearly for my clients (i.e., the discovery of living life to its fullest within each personâs desire). As someone who has suffered from then learned to live with anxiety and depression this was still a bold move…however, I hear life begins at the end of your comfort zone, a quote by Neale Donald Walsch and I was not going to let fear and the unknown hold me backâI would bring any uncomfortable thoughts, feelings, and so forth alongside me on this journey as I am determined to live my life to the fullest no matter what. While we each have to choose our own guiding principles, for me, they are Travel Far- Eat Well- Live Long- Love Optimally. Within it, I have come to the realization and embracement of no roots as I have found that I do not necessarily have roots in one certain physical place but wings that allow me to fly. If anything, my roots are found in the people I have met along the way that store space in my heart (like so many clients I have come to know and offer support), the experiences I have met through food, history, and culture along my travels, the richness of the life I have lived, and the ability and choice to love optimally. While your ideal life may not match mine and send you jet setting across multiple oceans…I would love to walk alongside you and help you discover (or re-discover) what it means to live life fully. If you think online therapy may be the right fit for you, I welcome you to contact me and begin your own âjourney.â
2020 Update: While I still have a love for traveling far and wide and continue to offer online Telemental Health Sessions, I now have re-established an in-person therapy practice within the state of California. To learn more click HERE
2022 Update: Back to Telehealth offering online therapy as my passport now includes extended travel in Asia â¤ď¸ đ§ł
Jennifer Hyatt 