Category: Mental Health

Season 1 Episode 5

SPLITTING, Part II

Listen now on SPOTIFY
https://spotifyanchor-web.app.link/e/pxPF5d853ub

Intro: 

         Hello and welcome to “The World in Black and White”My name is Michelle and I’m the narrator and creator of this podcast.

Vision for the podcast:

         My vision for  this podcast is that it will bring hope to all individuals that may be overwhelmed by the challenges mental illness can create as a person attempts to navigate life in a positive and successful way. I hope to help others by teaching forgiveness & self-awareness.

          I want to also make listeners aware of help that is available  Call one of these numbers or text them to find help.  I pray you always find someone there to pull you up.   

You can call or text 988.

Another helpline available through the National Alliance for Mental Illness is 800-950-6264 or text “HelpLine” to 62640

Announcements: 

         I am very excited to share some news with you all about an exceptional individual that I have just recently booked to be my first guest on our podcast.  Her name is Imi Lo, she is an author, psychotherapist, and life coach.  I have only recently discovered her while doing research over Borderline Personality Disorder. She first caught my attention with a long essay she wrote called “Positive Traits of BPD | Therapy and Coaching BPD (eggshelltherapy.com) 

I am halfway through her audiobook, it is looking at Borderline as an emotional gift rather than a disorder. The title of that audiobook is “Emotional Sensitivity and Intensity: How to manage intense emotions as a highly sensitive person” You should definitely look her up and check out her other books and youtube videos.  She is for sure an impressive guest and we feel so blessed to have her scheduled as our 1st guest speaker on our podcast.  Thank you Imi Lo, I can’t wait to get your feedback on a few questions.  I will announce the date as soon as we have one confirmed.  

       I have recently reached out to become a partner with NAMI, or the National Alliance for Mental Illness, to establish our school campus as one that will show compassion for those dealing with mental illness.  I went to the NAMI website and requested that information and I am now awaiting details to get that going.  I will be an advocate for anyone dealing with mental health issues.    

Splitting Part 2:

      Last week, I began discussing splitting and what that might mean to any person, especially a person dealing with a diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder.  This week, I will continue to dive into what defense mechanisms may look like in real life, and I will provide a few personal examples from my own life wherein splitting occurred. I will end with my thoughts on splitting and how it affects the BPD.. I did first want to acknowledge that splitting often occurs when the person dealing with BPD senses a relationship loss or that fear of abandonment.  Any relationship is important for the borderline.  Even the relationships that aren’t part of their daily life. Any event that activates the fear of abandonment for the person with BPD will trigger splitting.  

       First I want to look back at the results of my defense mechanism quiz I’ll take a closer look at the ones where I received a higher score.  If you listened to my previous episodes, I shared the results of my defense mechanism quiz, and the one I scored the highest on was regression, with 80. AHHHHHHH!  That surprised me…This one is categorized as a primitive defense mechanism. Coming in 2nd was repression at 40, and then tied for third, three ways are displacement, reaction formation, and compensation.   I was initially thinking that I used a lot of healthy defense mechanisms, like humor or assertiveness. It appears my subconscious has held onto more than a handful of not so healthy defense mechanisms to use as weapons in the moments where I feel threatened.

     Ok, so it sounds as though more times than not, I find myself in a state of regression, this happens when being confronted with a situation or person that doesn’t align with my expectations of that person or event.  The person I find that fails to meet my expectations the most… is me.  When I fail to meet my own expectations, I don’t focus on how to correct mistakes and get better.  I focus on how my inability to meet those expectations validates my feelings of being a failure.  I don’t know how true this is, but this might explain my constant need to find something I am good at.  During that process of “trying new things”  I will no doubt discover a lot of disappointment, especially when I haven’t given myself appropriate or realistic expectations for learning this new skill. An example of not setting realistic expectations for myself can be clearly seen by how I behaved and performed at a recent Co-Ed softball game.

       When I talked about my lack of skills with my husband after the game…and after he shook his head several times at me in disbelief, he calmly said “It is for fun, and if you aren’t having fun, you need to quit.”  He wasn’t wrong, but at the time… I felt he wanted me to quit.  That he didn’t understand all that was upsetting me and that he was being insensitive to me during my time of perceived failure.  Of course, after giving myself time to calm down, I could see that he didn’t say that he wanted me to quit.  I also know now that he did in fact just wanted me to have some fun, and that he was just looking out for my mental health.  

      It is crazy how different I see things when I am not looking at them through the eyes of emotional dysfunction.  I can clearly see now that I was asking my body to perform at a level I haven’t ever trained for and expecting this from a much older body, at 40 years old.  Why would I put those types of expectations on myself?  The simple answer: It is my desire to be pleasing.  Even though my wise mind or logical mind realizes that it is quite impossible to be pleasing at all times to everyone. Ok, so we have discussed regression along with a personal example.  I am sure there are a million other ways I express regression throughout my life, but this one was fresh and it explicitly shows my child-like response to an event where I didn’t perform to my expectations. 

     In 2nd place, repression with 40.  I know I repress a lot. I assume I do this a lot, basically because I don’t have a very good memory of my life. This defense mechanism is categorized as less primitive. 

The definition of repression is unconsciously keeping feelings, thoughts, or memories out of your awareness. It is done to protect ourselves from the anxiety or fear related to those memories. Because it’s done without our intention, the person has little control over the blocking of the memories. The blocked memories remain in our subconscious minds and continue to influence our feelings and behavior.

Repression is done without my control so if this happens at a score of 40 it means that my brain is doing this in some form or fashion to keep me feeling safe so i guess my brain is thinking it is helping me but in the long run I wish I could just remember stuff. 

      Now that I am more informed of the inner workings of my brain, realizing that my reactions are a direct result of a chemical response that occurs when I have been threatened with abandonment, I’m not just some girl living with a disorder. I choose to push my mental and emotional capacities to fight this disorder with the intent being on mindfulness and a hyper-focused awareness of my brain’s ability to express these natural and sometimes destructive responses.

 I have recognized my brain’s primitive ability to use maladaptive coping strategies or defense mechanisms automatically. My brain was reacting to events without consideration of the outcomes . I can see the error in the ways I have tried to handle relationship issues in the past.  I have moments now where I acknowledge my emotional response to an overwhelming event.  Instead of trying to control the situation or let my fear override my ability to just talk calmly and express my feelings.  I acknowledge that this response is not the response I want my body to produce.  I let the chemicals that are being dispersed by the command center (my brain) to course through my veins.  When my head finally returns to a more calm & clear headspace I try to address the “overwhelming event” that sent me into an emotional spiral.  When I can’t recall things now and have no working memory of it or feel overly emotional, I just say “My brain is being mean to me!” it is, and it is doing it without my permission.  So…Thanks chemicals

Tied for 3rd is compensation, reaction formation and displacement… to put them all in one mean little basket.  I tend to be an “asshole bully that will highlight my good qualities to hide my flaws” when pushed to my limits.  Compensation means I have a tendency to overcompensate in situations where I feel either unfamiliar or incompetent.  For reaction formation I will redirect attention to what I have done correctly, to divert attention from my mistakes. Lastly, displacement.  I really hate that I have a tendency to do this when I feel attacked or threatened, because this means I am dishing out to some poor undeserving soul. This defense mechanism makes me kind of sound like a bully.  Where you take out your emotional baggage on someone that is not as frightening as the one that made you feel threatened.  The situation that came to mind instantly was of a kid getting beat at home and then taking that rage out on the runt at school.  I don’t condone bullying, so I will have to be hypervigilant about this tendency. 

 I will end with my thoughts on splitting and how it affects the BPD, The BPD person is categorizing every action. Sorting people and events as they happen to the BPD.  The BPD compares the responses and interactions to their desired expectation for the person or event. The only acceptable reaction from a person in a relationship with the BPD is one that will not make the BPD look or feel unwanted or undesirable.  If this desired expectation isn’t met, one may still be categorized as ok or good, but if this behavior happens repetitively, where the involved person consistently doesn’t meet this expectation for the BPD or completely lets the BPD down or intentionally hurts the BPD.  I have no doubt that splitting will occur, the BPD will paint the perceived perpetrator as a pure negative or even an all evil individual, only capable of hating the person with BPD. The BPD is not in control when this delegation of evil occurs.  The splitting and painting black will continue to occur for the person dealing with BPD unless they try to logically understand what is taking place in the moment of emotional dysregulation. I can honestly tell you that this is a very very difficult thing to do.  I have found that once a person has been painted black, it is very difficult to remove the label the BPD has given them, but it is not impossible.  The person that they had previously adored, loved and placed on a pedestal can still become their loving partner once again, however it is a long and difficult journey for the person involved with a BPD.  

    First the person with BPD becomes avoidant of their feelings for their partner.  Then they must convince themselves that they were right to divert their trust, love and attention from that person.  They become foreign to their actual feelings for their partner because to stay and feel their true feelings about the emotional situation is too overwhelming for their brain to handle in the conscious, so it suppresses their feelings.  I am speaking honestly about how this has played out in my life over and over again and have not conducted any studies to make my statements move from my personal hypothesis to fact, but what I can assure you is that if the perceived perpetrator stays in the relationship long enough to prove their unconditional love and commitment to their partner the stronger the likelihood that the BPD can acknowledge their actual reality and start to make progress & to better understand the parts of their disorder they have no control over and focus more on the ones that they can control.  I now know that when I am upset with my partner because he didn’t say or do what I expected them to say or do to provide some sort of positive message to me is not anything to get overly emotional about or to log in the “bad bank” as evidence that they will eventually grow to hate you and leave you.   It happens first with splitting, painting them as bad, the BPD will cut off all feelings of emotion and discard the entire relationship.  

The constant labeling and categorizing isn’t fun for the BPD; it is something the brain is doing with expert level automaticity.  Once someone is painted black or compartmentalized as a “bad thing”  it is up to the BPD to remove that label and work at a realistic observation of the person.  It is very much due to the dichotomous thinking of the BPD and it is very hard to have lasting relationships and friendships while dealing with this type of brain disorder.  It makes those around you walk on eggshells especially if they are aware of your tendencies because they don’t want to be labeled as bad.  The irony in all of this is I really don’t judge people by their mistakes, I guess I only judge them by met or unmet expectations.  

Next week, we will talk about some of the strategies I have used to help me move beyond some of the hurdles splitting caused in my life, and hopefully some of those strategies will be of some use to you as well. 

Challenge for the week:Last week’s challenge was taking the defense mechanism quiz, that link is added in the description for easier access for listeners.  If you weren’t able to take that quiz last week, you should take it now.  It doesn’t take long and you might learn something about yourself.  The challenge for this week is to move outside of your comfort zone in at least one area of your life.  Challenge yourself to confront something you might be uncomfortable with, and see if the results you need to achieve are achieved. To give you some examples I will tell you a few things I have done lately that have pushed me outside of my comfort zone.  I went out with a group of friends that asked me to a group dinner spontaneously, we had an awesome time and became instant friends with that group.  I am assuming they feel the same way right now, but I did get a very warm and inviting feeling from each of them. That was out of the norm for me.  New people make me anxious.  The other things that I have decided to do that have pushed me out of my comfort zone is starting kickboxing and playing on a co-ed softball team with my husband and his co-workers.  What I have learned time and time again is that you can either catastrophize any event before it actually occurs or you can just give it your best and find out something interesting about your ability to move beyond that which is comfortable.   SO DO SOMETHING GOOD FOR YOUR SPIRIT THAT IS OUTSIDE OF YOUR COMFORT ZONE!  You may surprise yourself.     

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CLOSING:  Thanks so much for tuning in… We have come to the end of the podcast. What did you learn? Who can you share this podcast with? If this resonates with your spirit or makes you think of a certain someone that has experienced similar issues in their life, please share this with them.  I believe mental health is something we are overlooking on a massive scale, and in order for people to heal we need to be able to speak about this openly and honestly.

…Until next time… Choose truth, goodness and love! 

Want more understanding about living with Borderline Personality Disorder…

A Brief Look at My Life with Borderline Personality Disorder | NAMI: National Alliance on Mental Illness

Mental Health Myth Busters: Borderline Personality Disorder | NAMI

What Are You Afraid Of?

Fears, Mine & yours live within.

Mine, over time have combined and multiplied.

Fear can only live in the place without light,

It persuades you to give in, then surrender the fight.

I journey deeper to find what lurks there in the dark.

I see a long train tunnel, it is absent and cold.

Photo by Aleksey Kuprikov on Pexels.com

My mind warns, “stay where it’s safe, do not go.”

My soul urges my spirit to go deeper, into the black.

Darkness has one job, conceal

Concealing my false from my real.

There is some value to be gained here, my spirit feels

I calm myself a bit, wait for my body to stop shaking.

The words written on these walls, exposing.

It appears someone has tracked all of my mistakes.

So what? I messed up, what difference does that make?

I feel the vibrations of something in the distance

My fear reappears to offer stubborn resistance.

Is someone driving this train?

I grab ahold of the last train car, and pull myself inside

I feel the train is moving slower now, down to a steady glide

Why did my train suddenly slow down here?

My final destination isn’t fear.

Within the darkness my fear takes hold

One thing is clear, to leave this place, I must be bold.

I rise and dust off the negativity

Realizing this new sensitivity

to myself and my power

Photo by Tuur Tisseghem on Pexels.com

I make my way through the train,after thousands of hours

I know I must make it to the front of the train

If only I could get this desire to move to my brain.

allowing my spirit forward, breaking free from my paralyzed state

I must reach the light, it is where I will meet my fate

Photo by Alexander Zvir on Pexels.com

Fear, Mine & yours live within.

All souls must struggle with sin

Spirit knows it can’t be kept in the shade.

I’ve found her, she is so bold and unafraid.

Her light is my light

Parts of who I was, exposed by the light

Exposing my dark traits so that my spirit will survive.

Stepping into the light can be a terrifying fear

That is also where you must steer.

Turn your way towards light, it shall set you free

Surrendering your truths leads to victory

An ongoing spiritual battle

is also our eternal war.

To win, we must lose.

And battle no more!

After living in darkness & wrestling with my demons daily…

I am strong enough now to handle the light!

Surrender to the largeness of who you’re becoming.

“Parent-Child” Meet “Child-Parent”

An excerpt from one of my future books…

As I’m contemplating my day… this is what I heard the universe teaching me.


When a person decides to have and raise children, the parent usually experiences a bit of relief from child-rearing around 18ish. This may even occur much earlier, when the child hits the time of adolescence or perhaps even sooner, forced by environment.

When a child is then expected to raise a parent, there is no chance of relief! There will definitely not be any voluntary relief given from the parent to the child. The only relief will be the relief given when the child forces the parent away from their rearing! Like a good momma cat would at the first sign of the kitten taking care of themself. This interaction exhausts the responsible child “child-parent”and over time creates anger, resentment and bitterness. Everytime the parent “parent-child”literally & figuratively pulls up into the driveway, the child-parent begins to anticipate the need/s from the “parent-child”The body physically responds just as a new mother would respond if their angry, crying infant were laying down beside them. Quickly and with every intent on calming the baby’s need.

Every nerve of the nervous system tenses up on alert & with each pulse, a release of cortisol occurs followed by the intense anxiety. The “child-parent” having been trained to respond quickly to “parent-child’s” needs knows to react with haste. Fix the problem, stop the cries. “Parent-child” remains completely unaware of the burden and stress they are placing upon their own child. They may even say, “I thought you said that you would take care of me?” The parent-child is saying, “you can’t stop taking care of me, I still need to be taken care of.” The “child-parent” in absolute agony rips the “parent-child” from her breast and says “you are sucking the life out of me! Go take care of yourself!” That what she said as a child can by no means be held over her & that by some unspoken cosmic rule she would always be held responsible for your mishaps.

What contract did the “child-parent” unknowingly agree to? The “parent-child” knew exactly what they were doing and just didn’t care.

I think I hit that one on the nose!

Recipe:People Pleaser, Yields 1

www.youtube.com/watch

After watching the above YouTube video the following thoughts emerged. As I continue on my journey of self acceptance and self love… I dig much deeper into my childhood and realize now that there are very specific details that helped make me into a “super people pleaser!”

Want to know how one becomes a “super people pleaser?” Here is a short list of things that I have personally identified as common things people may have experienced or endured, which increases the likelihood of becoming a super people pleaser.

Ingredient #1] stress on the mother during pregnancy. This is said to release more cortisol levels for the unborn child. (Some have also said that this can create emotional disregulation because the unborn child is receiving too much of that stress hormone in utero that it literally messes with the design of the brain.)

Ingredient #2] place him/her in an environment that is strict and also stingy with positivity.

My mom and dad… What a long story. First of all, bless their hearts. I know that they were doing their best! I can honestly say that now after being a parent now for over a decade, & looking back at my mistakes in parenting. It’s not an easy job. Anyone that says otherwise is in denial. Trust me!

Ingredient #3] praise the child only when they do exactly what you want them to do.

Growing up I was constantly told to listen. I grew up with a very authoritative dad & my mom was just enough of an authoritarian that whatever she demanded, we delivered. She made sure that we listen to her and that we weren’t allowed to have our own opinions on things like food or clothing, anything really. We were always told “you’ll take what you can get & like it.” A seriously dangerous mantra from my childhood, and I just realized this is the reason I have a hard time making decisions for myself now in my 38th year of life. Doing what I want to do seems like an action for royalty, not me. If you treat your children like peasants they will expect bread crumbs, but will settle for any piece of the crust when it is presented. It will not matter if it is their piece of the pie or not they just want more than crumbs. They want to believe that they are worth more than crumbs. This idea that they aren’t able to make decisions for themselves leaves them listening to others needs and wants while suppressing their own. Ignoring the voice that makes them unique and authentic. This idea that they are unable to access this voice and be heard has been ingrained into their brain as if to know that the voice/desire to have what they want is there, but it is out of order. The child continues through life looking to everyone else for the answers and listening to “these so called answers” even to their own demise. Because their core value or belief of who they are rests on the belief that “you are only a good kid if you do what you are told.”

Well that was enlightening. Illuminating for myself even.

2020 has been quite the ride. We have been diligently working on remodeling our home. We are nearing completion and have redone every room of the house. I will be posting photos soon of all the changes. I will be very happy to complete this huge project, it has been a difficult one.

Happy Holidays everyone! I’m praying for a peaceful 2021!

A N G E R

Responding like a stoic…

Is anger a good thing or a bad thing? Anger, when first recognized, is actually just simply a warning. A signal from your amygdala blasting throughout your brain, sounding an alarm via chemicals, that warns your body that something is not right. Message received as, “there is a present threat and there is a possibility to fight, flight, or freeze.” Anger can therefore be seen as a natural response to external stimuli. It is a response that was designed in humans to help protect us in perceived dangerous situations. After reading what Seneca wrote on Anger, I concluded that he deduced that anger wasn’t natural, that reasoning was natural. The truth is, it requires more brain function to engage the logical areas of the brain. Leaving me to believe, emotion is more natural than thought.

The emotional response happens automatically. This emotional part of our brains (amygdala) is so much more developed than the logical part of our brain, which is known as the prefrontal cortex. The emotional part of our brain has kept us alive, reacting to the world without much thought to consequences, other than one that is primal, “Stay alive!” While this much developed area of my brain has kept me alive, it has also assumed for far too long that it is in charge. I have now learned that the prefrontal cortex can be trained/stimulated so that it can show the amygdala whose boss. Seneca was then saying that allowing our emotional brain to just run rampant in our lives wouldn’t be natural. The natural thing, the “good thing” is to have what we call In DBT, Dialectical Behavior Therapy, your wise mind always aware of what your amygdala and prefrontal cortex are doing. After studying stoicism and understanding that Cognitive Behavior Therapy was designed using stoicism. I can see how it’s philosophy is also helpful in The therapy I am currently receiving now. That this higher order thinking, being cognitively aware is the practice of stoicism. “through Stoic training, Aurelius was able to master his perceptions and see each obstacle as an opportunity to improve”(dailystoic.com) mastering our perceptions, added with the knowledge of how our minds naturally respond will help most manage anger.

You can find some exercises for the prefrontal cortex below…

https://heartmindonline.org/resources/10-exercises-for-your-prefrontal-cortex

If you have read any of my previous posts or know anything of Borderline Personality Disorder, becoming a stoic is changing the natural way in which my BPD brain will more than likely over respond to the difficult to digest external stimuli. Like black is to white, BPD is to stoicism. The way in which one chooses to respond to this automatic alarm system is what I believe answers our question today. When anger is triggered inside the mind, it is neither good nor bad. It is not decided until we respond.

Anger, shows duality, with the possibility of being both good and bad. Stoics believe that there is no good with anger. They were told to see that there is no good, because of all the “evil” it created. They want every stoic to believe that there is no good to be found in anger. I see the justifications of their message. A calm and sound mind, not writhing with “passions” can be controlled. One drowning in anger or other “passions” cannot. So then, if looking at it from this perspective, serenity isn’t the final goal, but rather control. Or does control get us to the place of serenity? I have had moments, in which I have given into passions of anger and it has kept me alive. So isn’t it necessary to be alive in order to be serene? Can we have one without the other?

I absolutely want to be a stoic sage someday, using this higher-order thinking to get through the most complicated of situations with clarity and peace of mind… I’m left perplexed at this particular question. While I understand what the stoic philosophers were trying to convey to their followers in those times, teaching people to seek serenity. Being calm and collected leads to logical thinking and sound decisions. I have also experienced anger on several levels. Ultimately, anger has ensured my existence during some pretty tough times. More recently, I find that I am just angry at myself and my mistakes and this anger has propelled me to find better ways to manage myself, my disorder, and my life. Has it been pretty? No, fighting my way to this point hasn’t been pretty. I feel that’s why we are all built in this way. There is no way to determine which human will be placed in prime conditions and which will be placed in tough conditions. The emotional tools we are equipped with may not be dispersed equally, but we were all equipped with the ability to learn. I choose now as I am on the verge of entering my forties, to learn this higher order thinking. Working a portion of the brain more and more, so that my logical mind becomes stronger every day. My ultimate goal being serenity in this deeply maddening world.

I had a discussion with my students the other day about anger. One student said, “as a kid, my counselor told me not to show my anger, but to keep my anger to myself.” I felt that wasn’t a very healthy way to teach a young person to deal with such an intense emotion. I asked him, “How has that advice worked out for you?” My student responded with, “I’m still trying to find a useful method to control my anger.”

I then asked, “what if we started looking at anger differently?” A lot of puzzled stares looking back at me. I then said, “what if we started looking at the positive ways in which anger can be of use to us? Can anger be of use to us? Can we manage it? Or do we let that emotion manage us?”

What if we started looking at the positive ways in which anger can be of use to us?

What are positive ways anger has helped you?

Can anger be of use to us?

Can we manage anger, or do we let anger manage us?

Emotions indicate so many things for an individual, learning to understand our emotions and why we choose to respond in certain ways, increases not only our emotional intelligence but the control we possess over ourselves. Why then should anyone just ignore this emotion, anger? Especially, when anger is often the first emotion we go to when life gets confusing, or when we are afraid, when we feel threatened or rejected.

“Anger is temporary madness: the Stoics knew how to curb it” By: Massimo Pigliucci, here he states 10 ways to curb anger! Maybe one of these can help…

  • Engage in preemptive meditation: think about what situations trigger your anger, and decide ahead of time how to deal with them.
  • Check anger as soon as you feel its symptoms. Don’t wait, or it will get out of control.
  • Associate with serene people, as much as possible; avoid irritable or angry ones. Moods are infective.
  • Play a musical instrument, or purposefully engage in whatever activity relaxes your mind. A relaxed mind does not get angry.
  • Seek environments with pleasing, not irritating, colours. Manipulating external circumstances actually has an effect on our moods.
  • Don’t engage in discussions when you are tired, you will be more prone to irritation, which can then escalate into anger.
  • Don’t start discussions when you are thirsty or hungry, for the same reason.
  • Deploy self-deprecating humour, our main weapon against the unpredictability of the Universe, and the predictable nastiness of some of our fellow human beings.
  • Practice cognitive distancing – what Seneca calls ‘delaying’ your response – by going for a walk, or retire to the bathroom, anything that will allow you a breather from a tense situation.
  • Change your body to change your mind: deliberately slow down your steps, lower the tone of your voice, impose on your body the demeanour of a calm person.

My Conclusion: I thought about anger for an entire week. Oddly enough it kept me from getting angry. While I may not have answered the question for everyone here, my answer is… Anger, like all other emotions is necessary. It is neither a good or bad thing. To let it get out of control is bad. To see what it can do for us when we need it to survive, is good.

Have a great day! The end! 🙂

A game that could help improve logic… Chess

**Wanted to include a huge thanks to @dailystoic and @stoiccoffeebreak for wonderful podcasts! Thanks for stirring good thoughts and inspiring and motivating me to change the things I can control. Check out their podcasts if you are learning on the stoic philosophy.

How I Define LOVE…

I heard this week on a YouTube Channel that “Love is not an emotion or a feeling, but just the lack of hate.”  It was something I couldn’t let go of.  I kept the thought rotating on the spit in my mind like a huge chicken roasting on a rotisserie… A chicken I had just named LOVE.  Thinking, oh when I am done roasting this thought, it will taste so good for all who choose to eat with me.

The thing is the longer I think of it, ponder on it, the more love I feel.  The longer I get lost in my memories, the more I am directed to moments that I received care, received compassion and forgiveness.  These are all actions that have made me feel loved.  How do I show love?  Do I show love to myself, and do those I do love know that I love them?  Is love sacrifice?  Is love pain?  Is love just good feelings and happy thoughts?  Is love tears of joy or sadness? What if it were more simply described for all of us?  I can sum it up in three words.

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I believe I can be a caring person, a forgiving and compassionate person.  Can I be those things to someone who irritates, frustrates, or ignites anger in me?  Why do some people cause us to react negatively?  If I am a loving person, can I react like that to anyone?  I have to be accepting of everyone, no matter their background, political affiliation, educational level, financial situation, no matter what.  I have to accept everyone to show love.  So if I am to love everyone, I must hold judgement of everyone?  I must accept each and every person on this planet in order to LOVE.  I have to love murderers, and rapists, and pedophiles, and hookers, and white supremicist, and terrorists and even the boogie man, I have to accept ALL?  Oh my! No wonder there is so much hate in the world.  It is so much easier to judge and only accept the things we like in others.  What if we could heal all of those things with LOVE.  Thinking of this creates a nice picture and maybe my internal drive of perfection is taking over, but doesn’t it take you to a utopia?

Want to know love?  If God is love, here is the description of LOVE. Sounds like an unachievable perfection, doesn’t it?

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Anyone that has lived longer than 5 years has experienced an unloving moment, has learned not to trust, not to hope, to be rude, to be impatient, to tell a lie.  We were all born with a root of evil and a spirit of love.  How do we release ourselves with this entangled root of evil.  Where do we find the ability to release it from ourselves.  We have to know GOD.  I know most of us that chose to go to Vacation Bible School when we were younger or maybe even forced to go; had to learn a scripture.  John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believed in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

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If I dissect this one scripture, I can discover so much.  I have repeated it so many times in my life, and yet I have never actually looked at the scripture as a key to living forever.  “The WORLD” = each of us!  All of our sins, our misconducts, our flaws, all of us.  Every single one of us make up THE WORLD. He LOVES us (the world) so much that he sacrificed perfection, for us.  His SON = perfection.  The only perfect being ever made was sacrificed for our messed up, imperfect lives.  Once we believe in LOVE, we have EVERLASTING LIFE?  Wait, what?  What does it all mean?  He should have chosen quality over quantity, right?  We do! What am I missing, what have I been missing?

If God can give up his most beloved and perfect masterpiece, what is holding me back?  I want to love and yet I can’t even get over myself.  My insecurities keep me fearful.  I can’t speak the truth, afraid of others reactions.  I have built a prison and I should be living free in the spirit.  His Spirit.  Even now while I am mulling all of this over while I am writing I am considering the responses I might get from people who might label me a bible thumper, religious freak.  Honestly, I consider that an insult.  I believe in God, but don’t categorize me as one of THOSE people.  Look there it is, that ROOT.  Rearing it’s ugly head again.   I know everyone has an opinion.  Maybe we shouldn’t!  Once we require an opinion we should pray for the Spirit to lead us to the correct one.  I know that this sounds a bit like the rantings of a lunatic, but what if they aren’t?  What if they are from Him, and he is using some misfit teacher who has failed multiple times in marriage and who has had to fight to keep everyone that is close to her as a messenger of LOVE.  WTH?  I can’t even believe I just wrote that.

My brother and I throw ideas, revelations, scriptures back and forth to each other; through text messages.  He sent me one that said, “Live freely, animated and motivated by God’s Spirit.  Then you won’t feed the compulsions of selfishness.  For there is a root of sinful self-interest in us that is at odds with a free spirit, just as the free spirit is incompatible with selfishness.”  I bring this up because I began writing a blog to vent my thoughts and to help others that might be experiencing life the same way.  I kept looking for something to make me feel better, something to make me look better, something to make me appear perfect.  All of those things were selfish and my actions were coming from the root of sinful self-interest.  I watered that root until it had nearly taken hold of every fiber of my being.  I saw nothing wrong with my endeavors, nothing wrong with what I was seeking.  It was for a better me!  Society tells us that is what we should all be doing.  “Don’t stop yourself, indulge!”  “BUY MORE! LIVE MORE! BE MORE!”

My message is this, That root of sinful self-interest can never get enough and it has been planted inside each of us.  Have you ever actually dug a root out of the ground.  It is quite the job.  It is not like we can just find it and pluck it out.  We must work it out, and realize why it had been planted there in the first place.  Without it, we wouldn’t have the need to look for LOVE.  I still don’t know how to rid myself of the thoughts or the shameful places this “root” takes me, but I know I can no longer feed it.  I must acknowledge that it is there and find the spirit that is of LOVE and water & feed it, to show this “root” there is no longer any room for it to dwell inside of me.

Do you know why I must accept this “root?”  If I can’t find it in myself to accept who I am and understand what I am capable of, and love myself in spite of all of that, my love for others is only coming from a place that only serves my self-interest.  I am only loving so that I may be loved.  I have to forfeit that idea of romantic love. My ideas of fairy tales can not be my description of love.  I must accept all the parts of who I am, the dark and gloomy parts, the weak and scared parts, the indulgent and insecure parts or I will never be able to have love for others.  It will all be artificial.  Be real with yourself!

I have heard from several people in my life that I am not judgmental.  Immediately, when I hear this I think… “Yeah, I know I don’t want others to judge me so I don’t judge others.”  People living in sinful self-interest, can’t handle shame.  I didn’t want to impart my honest remarks on how others chose to live their life, what if they decided to be honest about my choices.  That would bring shame and that would hurt my feelings.  My precious ego wouldn’t be able to survive.  Can we grow without honesty?  I think I cleared that up last week.  I believe no growth can occur without honesty.  Love rejoices in the truth. Start LOVING this week by being HONEST with yourself and be led by the SPIRIT, not grounded by the ROOT of sinful self-interest.  Teach others that it is ok to love the messy and messed up.  BE the change this world needs to see by spreading truth,   without judgment.239b2aeb45415859920af6834f9b22e6

My definition of love is this…  It is releasing your needs, and helping others.  It is accepting the mistakes and misfortunes of others.  Love is not about YOU, it is about His Spirit.  His Spirit is in each of us, so when we accept that we are all imperfect yet truly loveable, we are truly loving ourselves.

Do not SEEK love my friends, seek to TEACH everyone where it can be found.  We all have it, someone might need to water and nurture it a bit more than others.  I will leave you with this to think of as well.  A bit of wisdom spoken by my dad a few days ago.  When asked “What is the cause of human suffering?”  My dad said, “It’s real simple, we must love our neighbor!”  I think the world needs a refresher course on what love is, then we need to show love to each other.  Love does meet the requirements of a four letter word.  But this word isn’t dirty or shameful, it isn’t evil or self-seeking.  It is a word we all need to become better acquainted with, and it is a word that should most definitely be felt by each of us.  It should be felt growing inside each of us.

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Have a great day! Love, Michelle

How Comfortable Are We With Honesty?

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How many times have you been in a conversation that ended up in an argument because one of you was just honest? I have had many conversations recently where I had to hear truth, I mean hard to swallow, HONESTY! I felt like saying, “keep those things to yourself and lie to me.” My ego may be just a bit too fragile. I can add here that anything that is negative sounding honesty I say the person is just being mean, because I have an internal struggle with portraying perfection. I really had to take a good long look at myself and understand that while the truth is hard to hear, this is where growth happens. I know the difference of being mean and being honest. The person that told me these things was not trying to be mean. They wanted me to look at things from their perspective. Empathy is not a strength for a person that has BPD. Their is a liberating feeling that comes from accepting the truth about who you are, then realizing people do exist in the world that will love you for ALL that you are!

I have had to hear that I am “selfish, deceptive, cold, cruel, heartless, not able to love, irresponsible, unreliable, impulsive, brash, blunt, a procrastinator, unaware of myself and unable to see how my actions affect others, and last but not least, crazy.”   I have also heard all of these things from one person, my husband.  He has been with me for 11 years, he knows me.  He would surely give me an accurate description of who I am, right?  An honest description of how he views me.  I can accept these things now, before accepting my disorder, I would try to defend these things about myself. Who wants to be seen like this?  I will tell you… No one, we all try to show the pretty side of ourselves to the world.  Our “Parade-ready, big smiles and incessant waving” self for the world and save the “Messy bed-head, no make-up, sweat-pants wearing” self for those closest to us.

I can not change these things unless I first accept that these are things that are also in my toolbox.  I can be selfish, deceptive, cruel, heartless, not able to love, irresponsible, unreliable, impulsive, brash, blunt, a procrastinator, unaware of myself and unable to see how my actions affect others, and last but not least, crazy.”  Just because I can be like this, doesn’t mean that I have to be.  The other side of this truth is that I have heard that I can be the most fun-loving person, too friendly at times, too trusting, non-judgmental, hilarious, imaginative, creative, and full of potential, I have been told that I am a great teacher, a great writer, a wonderful wife and mother, a good person.  I want to think these are the only things that people experience of me.  The truth is, it’s not.  If you have known me for some time you have seen the bright shiny parade, and you have also seen the dark and gloomy, couch potato.  img_0395

Of course we love having people tell us what we want to hear about ourselves.  To only reflect our “parade-ready” selves to help add layers of protection to our egos.  If you don’t have someone in your life to put aside the bull-shit and give you the full list of how they see you, I don’t imagine you will ever grow or evolve from the person you are now.  If you have someone in your life that can speak honestly about all that they see in you, tell them Thank You!  They are helping you become who you were meant to be.  I am writing this and thinking at the very same time that I have not been very thankful for honesty in my life.  I have been so good at deceiving others and had relied on the power of creating my own truth for so long that I have been depriving the world of who I truly am, plain and simply put… I can be ME and you can be YOU!  Enjoy looking into your tool box and picking out the best tools for the job you have ahead of you today.  You are the creator of your daily masterpiece, what will you create? Please remember that honesty works both ways, share your honesty with others not to impede their growth.

The old saying goes “Only a true friend would be that honest!”  I have been the topic of much gossip in the town where I live now, and my little hometown. Obviously the choices I have made in life, my journey including my mistakes have made my life quite juicy with erotic undertones and misunderstood obstacles.  The better the gossip king/queen, I assume the more my name has passed through their lips.  I know that my life may be interesting, but let me be a true friend today and tell you this.  If you aren’t accepting your own truths about your life and all the flaws that make you who you are, don’t attempt to share anyone else’s.  That is all!  Life is too short to only focus on the negative parts of our journey, learn your lessons and move on.  The struggles that lie ahead await your new found strength.  Let this be a lesson to others, that I have had to learn the hard way.  Be a true friend, everyday… and be the truest of friends to yourself!

This post was motivated by the last two weeks of my life and a couple of conversations I have had with some friends. I haven’t stopped writing, I just stopped writing in my blog to work on a life-long dream of writing a book. The words just started flowing the other day and I didn’t want it to stop. I have made it to the start of Chapter 3 with only 50 more chapters to write. I can’t wait to complete this project, one that I have always wanted to accomplish. I am a person that has always loved to get lost in books, and could travel to other parts of the world through pages in a book. I hope to provide this sort of travel to my future readers. Thanks for stopping by and I hope that you have received something from my words today.

I honestly hope you all have a wonderful day!

Neurofeedback… My Personal Experience and Research

I was going to do a podcast on this topic, and I may still choose to do one later on… Here is the information I have found to help introduce the therapy I am currently using to help manage my symptoms of BPD.

Video : What is Neurofeedback?

Website: Explains this very well!

I have recently started neurofeedback therapy.  I have had 4 treatments lasting anywhere from 30 to 40 minutes.  The side effects I have noticed are feeling a bit more tired than usual, which is usually cured with an hour long nap. It has also caused me to be a bit more sensitive to situations that test my emotions.  More frequent mood swings, but ones that were short lived and easier to manage.

**I am not a medical professional and do not offer my experiences as general expectations for any person.  These are only my own personal observations.  I feel each person may have their own unique experience when dealing with methods to help cope with BPD.**

I have listened to several youtube channels of doctors trying to explain what a person dealing with BPD looks like.  What I have noticed, is that they have labeled us as individuals that are hard to work with.  This is obviously based on individuals that they have treated, that are hard to work with.  They blame this incompatibility on the client suffering from BPD because BPD sufferers have dichotomous thinking, We have a tendency to perceive the therapist to either be “all good” or “all bad”  I feel that if doctors are aware of our ability to think in this way, maybe they should try a little harder to be on the side of “all good”  in order to help their client achieve some relief of the symptoms of BPD.

I have been lucky enough to visit with two counselors that conduct each visit with care and compassion.  I don’t feel that is too much to ask from other individuals, especially those being paid to help you manage and better understand your mental afflictions.  I have read books that have been super beneficial with my struggle and I have started a treatment that I barely knew anything about, purely at the suggestion of a caring counselor.  I have noticed significant benefits and of course as with anything, there are some downside to it as well, but nothing I can’t handle or overcome.

I started this blog to help people who suffer from BPD find comfort in the fact that they aren’t alone, that we don’t have to wear a mask of perfection all the time, and that someone out there in the world appreciates that you are surviving each and every hardship that may hit you daily.  I also started this blog to help couples understand that relationships even those that aren’t dealing with mental health issues require time, attention, and hard work.  I feel that the outcome depends purely on the investment you are willing to make.

I was asked to try biofeedback after seeing my children’s counselor during our family therapy sessions.  I told her I was willing to try anything.  The very next counseling session she hooked me up.  The biofeedback helps read your brain waves.  I know they say that it doesn’t do anything to the brain, but I have actually left needing a nap like I had just completed a two-hour, mind-numbing test or something.  My brain must be doing mental gymnastics during my sessions… I am completely zapped afterwards.  The data that is collected is supposed to show some if any dis-regulation in the brain waves.

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I wanted to present this information early and track my progress.  I do feel that it has helped with my anxiety and I do feel a bit more focused.  My energy levels are still low, but this could also be due to the fact that my hormones are still out of whack. I am also working with my Nurse Practitioner to resolve those issues as well.

The thing that has been the best tool in managing BPD is self-awareness.  We may not be able to manage the emotions as situations arise… I know this is something I still struggle with, but we can choose to be more present and less day-dreamy to have control over our actions and how we interact with those around us.  It isn’t easy and I do understand the desire to get lost in thoughts can sometimes be overwhelming, but allow yourself to practice being present and it becomes easier.  This I can guarantee.

Good luck and have a blessed day!

Self Help Saturday: The Meanings of Life

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I know that most of us search for our purpose in life, hoping for it to be something worth bragging about.  A high paying job, maybe something that carries a title to remind you of your importance.  An incredible home or car, a hope that happiness can be held by obtaining material things. To fulfill a calling to a certain field of service, to preach or to sacrifice your life to a higher calling, like that of a nun or maybe even a priest.  I feel like these things yield insight to why we were really formed, and what all of us should seek to obtain in life.

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I had a moment this morning to be in the stillness of the day and realized that it wasn’t still at all.  I woke at 4:15 this morning and I made me a bowl of grape nuts, I enjoy the taste of this cereal now as an adult, but my decision to eat this cereal didn’t start with a craving for a healthy cereal.  My grandmother used to eat this cereal.  I would ask to have some of her cereal when I was a little girl and was perplexed as to why she would eat this hard, crunchy, nearly sugarless cereal.  I didn’t understand then that her reasons for eating this cereal was more for the nutritional value and less for the taste it produced.  I choose to eat the cereal now because it makes me think of my grandmother and it is a way to cherish her, savor her memory.  I then began to think of the other memories I had with my grandma.  She would keep us when we were little, and while the memories I have collected of time spent with her are not epic memories, they were and remain to be special.

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She had a little trailer house in a small town.  This small trailer was a special place for me, it consisted of 2 regular sized rooms and a small room that was more than likely meant to be a laundry room, but it was converted into a small spare bedroom.  There was one main bathroom and a half bath in the master bedroom, if you could call it that.  My grandmother’s house was always well kept and had a special ambiance produced by fluorescent lights under the cabinets that created warm swirls of light in the kitchen and it either always smelled of cleaner, or home cooked meals.  My grandma was a special lady.  She always made me feel safe and loved.

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I can remember waking up in that small bedroom or in rare instances waking up in her bed.  I wouldn’t always get to sleep with her, she said I would roll over her many times through the night or nearly kick her out of bed.  I am a very hard sleeper and apparently, as a child, a violent one.  🙂 I would wake to the smell of eggs and bacon being cooked to over-medium perfection, The aroma filling that small house to the brim, and reminding me of where I was at the first moment of waking.  I would clumsily jump from the bed and walk to the kitchen.

I would get a nice hug from her and a nice hot, plate of love sprinkled with the correct amount of salt and pepper that fell from the two white tall plastic salt and pepper shakers that I will always identify as the kind my grandma kept near her stove or on the kitchen table.  Before it would get hot, we would sit out on her front porch and watch life happen.  People driving in and out of town, and noticing the different colors and styles of the vehicles traveling down the town’s main street.  I didn’t care what we would do, I was enjoying my time with my grandma.  She was a very strong comfort to me as a child.  I don’t have a lot of strong memories of being a kid, and maybe part of the reason I hold onto these memories with her was my ability to relax in her presence, but these memories with her are vivid.  I know that they may not mean much to most reading this now, but one of the things I would do with my grandma was walk to the post office.  She would let me have the box key and find her box and grab her mail.  I don’t know why, but sometimes I can think of those events and miss the smell of that building.  I visit it from time to time just to inhale the fragrance of love letters and bills.  My grandma is still living in those memories, and it makes me feel calm, safe and loved.  I grew up and my grandma has been dead for several years.  I joined the military and while I had plans to come back from the military and start college near my hometown, I decided to buy her little trailer house that had been left to my uncle.  He had stayed with her, and was her caretaker for as long as I can remember.  I remember coming back to that place and feeling a little disappointed when it no longer held the charm that she gave it.  I am sure she didn’t really know how truly amazing I felt she was.

A unique and special human being.  My grandma didn’t have a special job, but her role as a mom and a grandma is one she fulfilled honorably.  She didn’t have a fancy house, or tons of money. Her wealth was in her gifts of cooking, cleaning and loving her family and friends.  She, in my opinion, had a rich life.  I have only given you a glimpse of this special women today, because that is where my prayers took me this morning, maybe it was a certain bird’s song this morning that triggered this memory or maybe it was the time of morning sitting out on my back porch, that was similar to sharing her front porch watching the buzz of the morning traffic. Whatever it was, her memory visited me heavy this morning and that is when it hit me.  She was a happy woman.  She didn’t have much, and she was able to still give to those in need.  She was a person that didn’t hold some special title, but still someone I admired very much.  She never told me when I was little that she had found the meaning of life, but she told me this morning.

Life is about love, forgiveness, and relationships.  All other things are trivial.  Love is something more than just a feeling.  It is in the food we make.  It is in the actions we choose.  It is in a sympathetic hug or a self-less sacrifice.  Love is in the way we adore something or someone.  It is our commitment and loyalty.  Love is a choice, a decision made to show the world compassion and understanding.  To truly love we forget our own needs, and begin a mission to meet the needs of others.  Be loving today!

Forgiveness, if we were not human, we would have no use for this word.  Do you think animals ask forgiveness?  Does the bird apologize to the worm for having it for breakfast.  Forgiveness, our need for acceptance, and appreciation set us apart from animals.  I realized that we must forgive ourselves first.  Before one can truly offer forgiveness we must first extend and accept it for ourselves.  No person is perfect, so all have felt some self-betrayal at some point in which forgiving yourself was necessary.  I thought I knew what forgiveness was, but I didn’t really understand it until this past year.  I received forgiveness from my husband.  He had no reason to forgive me, to give me yet another chance.  He made a choice to work on our relationship.  That decision grew from his first act of forgiveness. I wonder if he would have still made this choice knowing all that he knows now.  How difficult forgiveness can be and how incapable we are without God’s grace to provide complete forgiveness.   We are humans, still just a small step separates us from the animals.

When we decide to love and to forgive we open up our hearts to these amazing things called relationships.  If you want to truly be great, take time to build those important relationships with your loved ones.  When you depart from this life… What will be remembered?  I want people to think of me like I think of my grandma.  A special woman, that blessed other people’s life with love and forgiveness.  This may not be everyone’s equation of happiness, but for me, it all makes the reason we are here make a bit more sense.

Love your writer,

Michelle C

This entry is dedicated to my grandma, Maxine! I miss you so much, and so thankful for the wonderful memories you created with me as a child.  I hope that my life is half as fulfilling as yours.