Stress Management: Mindfulness

Mindfulness is not only a very powerful way to manage your stress, but it will also open the door to the deeper possibilities in your life, the door that chronic stress keeps shut tight.

Typically your mind will distract you and pull you into anxious concerns about the past or future or into some random train of worrisome thought. Stress often follows as a result.

Mindfulness involves bringing your attention into the present moment, so you can be aware and notice what’s going on here and now. By learning to be in the present moment more of the time, you’ll not only reduce your stress but you will also connect to deeper levels of who you are.

When you’re mindful of what you are thinking you can stand free of your thoughts, instead of becoming possessed and defined by them. If you train to be mindful, you’ll pull the plug on stress and its consequences, including anxiety, depression, panic, self-doubt, and serious a variety of serious health problems.

It’s your thoughts that drive your stress. Your mind is always thinking automatically and discursively. It wanders without any clear purpose from one subject to another, often times darting back and forth toward concerns that leave you worried and anxious.  If you learn how to be mindful you’ll learn how to control your thinking and your emotional reactions to what you’re thinking.

Most of the time, you don’t intentionally think your thoughts-they just happen.  And most of the time, you just follow them. And if you are not attentive or mindful to where your mind is and to where it’s taking you-you’ll wind up in a negative flow of thought that leaves you starring in one or another stressful movie.

Mindfulness is Paying Attention and Noticing

Imagine a person in a train station, a person who can’t resist getting on every train that pulls into the station. Day in and day out she gets on trains all day long, trains that take her to places she didn’t plan on going to, places that she then has to make her way back from.

If she was mindful, she could pay attention and not get on the wrong trains. Or she could notice that she was on a train heading off to a place she didn’t want to go, and then get off as soon as possible. Mindfulness is paying attention and noticing.

Stay Off That Train

Every day, endless “trains of thought” pull into your mind. And like the person in our illustration, you get on them and ride them to wherever they take you.  And they usually take you for rides and to destinations that are stressful.

Did you know that left on its own, your mind will worry and dwell on the negative? That’s just the way it is. And the more emotional baggage you’re carrying and the more tough times you’re facing-the more negative your thought flow will be and the more stress will drop in your lap as a result.

You Do Not Have a Mind and a Body

Mindbody Science made a breathtaking discovery, a discovery that is still not commonly known or understood by most people, including medical physicians. The discovery is this: Your mind and body are not two separate things, they are an interdependent unit-your “mindbody”.

This discovery renders obsolete the view that our health is a “Body-Only” affair, a view still held by most health care providers. What you think and feel manifests in every cell in your body. And what’s going on in your body affects what you think and feel. That’s the mindbody connection.

The mindbody connection accounts for why stress is the #1 health and quality of life problem in the entire developed world. Here’s the problem: Stress is not just about feeling tired and frazzled and burnt out. It’s about toxic stress hormones that get released into your body in error.

Your body is hard wired for a survival response known as the Fight or Flight Response. When it’s triggered it releases hormones that prepare you to fight or flee life threatening danger. The problem is that your mind triggers this response in error. A part of your brain can’t tell the difference between your fears and worries and actual life threatening danger.

As stress hormones seep into your blood and tissues and linger there over long periods, you become at risk for anxiety, panic, depression and heart disease, cancer and diabetes, among other health problems.

You Can Train for Mindfulness to Manage Stress

Recall that your mind is always moving, you’re always thinking. The problem is that you get distracted by and identified with what you’re thinking and your thoughts and feelings get out of control and begin to define your reality. That triggers your Fight or Flight Response, which unfortunately triggers more worry and so a vicious cycle of stress and stress hormones.

When you develop mindfulness, you’ll notice that you’re following your thoughts and stop, thereby shortcutting the Fight or Flight Response before it releases stress hormones into your system.

Sitting cross-legged in meditation is not the only way or the most effective way to develop mindfulness. MESICS Training is a great way for westerners to develop strong and stable mindfulness. M-E-S-I-C-S is an acronym for the Latin phrase “Mens Sana In Corpore Sano” It means: A Sound Mind in a Healthy Body”.

MESICS Training^TM translates western medical science discoveries and eastern meditative and healing wisdom into actionable knowledge and combines that knowledge with powerful tools and expert support-so people can cultivate mindfulness, gain control of their lives and live long and well.

Personal Growth and the Two Wolves

This story gives great insight into the real work of personal
growth and “Inner Fitness”

One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle
that goes on inside people.  He said, ‘My son, the battle is
between two ‘wolves’ inside us all.

One is Evil.  It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed
arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false
pride,superiority, and ego.

The other is Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity,
humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth,
compassion and faith.’

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his
grandfather: ‘Which wolf wins?’

The old Cherokee simply replied,
‘The one you feed.’

Personal Growth: What God Told Amy and Jack

One day God couldn’t take Amy and Jack praying to Him any longer. They prayed everyday for so many things that it took God many hours just to listen to them. They wanted to sell their little grocery store in a small town and be able to move into the big city and be free from the constraints of their family, a family that lived in the same small town for five generations.

God came down and met with Jack and Amy. He told them, “I will grant you three wishes and three wishes only. After that, don’t bother me anymore. I’m busy.” They were thrilled but they were uncertain about exactly what to ask God for. Finally, they decided. For their first wish, they wanted to be so rich that they could leave and start a huge business in New York City while they lived at Trump Towers.

God granted them their wish. However, after a few months they grew homesick. And they were having a lot of complicated business problems; much of their money was at risk. Jack and Amy missed the simple life of their grocery store and the daily connection with their family. They were ready to call God for their second wish, but they were so shaky and uncertain about exactly what to ask for that they were beside themselves.

Amy woke up one morning with a brilliant idea. She told Jack and they called God. “Dearly beloved God”, they began, “we are so unsure, confused and stressed out about what to ask you for that we’ve decided that for our second wish we want you to tell us what to ask for—for our third wish.”

God laughed out loud. He said, “That’s easy. Ask for “Unshakable Certainty”, then you’ll be happy, fulfilled and satisfied no matter what.”

How much better would your life be if you were more clear, more steady and more secure about who you are, about your work, about your relationships, and about where your life is going?

How much different would your life be if you had Unshakable Certainty?

If you had Unshakable Certainty you would live much better than you could possibly live without it. With it, you would be comfortable with yourself in virtually all circumstances. You wouldn’t second guess yourself because you would know who you are well enough to understand and accept your own responses to life’s challenges.

Less Stress, Fear, Worry, Self-Doubt and Depression

Your inner trust and self-assurance would allow you to control or eliminate the nagging worries and apprehensions that trouble most people. Unshakable Certainty would give you the master key for a deeply satisfying life that could be well-lived, loved and understood.

With Unshakable Certainty, you wouldn’t have to battle with fear, self-doubt, worry, anxiety and depression. As a matter of fact, you would know how to deal with these and other negative states of mind skillfully without becoming identified with or defined by them. Your life could rest on the rock solid self-assurance, security and conviction that only Unshakable Certainty can bring.

The Power and Relief of Deep Self-Assurance

With Unshakable Certainty, you could create success in the world from the inside out, success based on your unique and personal vision. You wouldn’t burden yourself by dwelling on your failures and shortcomings; instead you would highlight and honor your strengths and successes, and your self-assurance would allow you to build on them.

Moreover, your successes wouldn’t be just about outside recognition, they would be about inner satisfaction, the kind that bring you the joy of accomplishing things that really mean something and matter to you. Your life and achievements would be pulled from up ahead by your purpose and dreams, instead of being pushed from behind by your fears and worries, or pushed from the side by popular opinion and social pressure.

With Unshakable Certainty you’d be confident that you could deal with whatever comes your way; you would handle people and new situations with ease. You would be able to stand free from guilt, doubt and insecurity, and you would feel good about what you are doing and where you are going. You’d be able to make the high quality choices required to live a high quality life.

Want to Be Happy When You Wake Up Most Every Day?

Unshakable Certainty would allow you to discover your special gifts and to take the sure and steady action necessary to develop them, action based on an accurate understanding of the forces at play within yourself and of the forces at play outside in the world around you. Self-assurance, deep conviction and integrity would allow you to live life on your own terms while making creative and meaningful decisions rooted in who you deeply are.

Your personal choices would then honor and express your own needs and interests—needs and interests you could guide with a compassionate concern for others and by a desire to make a difference in the world. You’d be able to create a life filled with freedom and with a sense of mission, a life that you’d be very happy to wake up to every day.

If you are shaky and uncertain in your life, one thing is for sure—it won’t be satisfying or a lot of fun. Here’s why. Your life will be made small by fear, self-doubt and hesitation. Without Unshakable Certainty, you’ll live in recurring doubt about who you are, about your work and relationships, and about what your life means and should be all about. Your life will feel a bit like something you just don’t have the manual or the tools to make work properly. You’ll spend your days caught in self talk, self-doubt and anxious hopes for relief and fears that relief won’t come.

Without Unshakable Certainty—It’s Almost Always Raining

You’ll experience conflict and confusion on a regular basis. In the morning you might feel OK about your marriage or your work and your approach to life only to have the sands shift by noon when you feel just as sure that your marriage is wrong or that you should have left your well-paying, but uninteresting job to do other more meaningful work. Then the next hour or day, you can feel completely different again; your values will tend to shift so much that you won’t be sure what to believe any longer. You can find yourself at the mercy of your last state of mind or of the last expert you listened to or book you read.

And as if all this wasn’t bad enough, without Unshakable Certainty, you’ll feel more stressed out, bored and bummed out, and as a result you’ll be more vulnerable to health problems that limit and that can even shorten your life. Shaky uncertainty generates a lot of chronic stress and unhappiness, an awful combination and one that causes illness and that claims many lives each year.

The Dream Killer—Self-Doubt

If you lack Unshakable Certainty, you’ll tend to avoid the risks of learning how to do what’s necessary to live a more exciting, more creative and more rewarding life—but it won’t be because you don’t want to. You’ll want a better life, but because you’ll doubt that your efforts to have one will be successful, you won’t act to create what you want. You may want badly to cross the street, but if you don’t believe and expect that your legs will get you there—you’re not going to take that first step. With shaky uncertainty clarity is not possible, and doubt and hesitation will leave you standing still while your life just drives by.

If you are shaky and uncertain, recurring moods of self-doubt, confusion and inner conflict, and the worry, indecision and resentment that come with these moods, will force you to play it safe. Like a big corporation that has its worried eyes glued on the short-term bottom line, we miss the big rewards that life can deliver if we live it as a long-term adventure—rather than as an occasion to avoid short-term risk.

Is Your Identity a Few Sizes Too Small?

Your biggest danger is that shaky uncertainty will keep you trapped in an identity and in a life that’s too small for who you truly are. Then you’ll become more like a passenger than a driver on the road of your life. You’ll do what you feel you should and must, not what you really want and love, and worse still, without deep self-assurance and conviction—you might never even discover what you truly want and love.

So how can you find Unshakable Certainty? What do you need to know to get free from stress, anxiety, and depression, stay healthy and live with the steady self-assurance and deep conviction?

MESICS® is an organization dedicated to helping as many people as possible find and live from Unshakable Certainty. M-E-S-I-C-S is an acronym for the Latin phrase: Mens Sana In Corpore Sano. It means “A Sound Mind in a Healthy Body”.

MESICS Training translates western scientific discoveries and eastern meditative and “Inner Fitness” wisdom into actionable knowledge. We bundle that actionable knowledge with powerful tools and expert support and training—so you can put that knowledge to work to protect your health and live your life with gusto as an adventure beyond stress and conditioned limits.

The first stop on your road to Unshakable Certainty is to connect to the Stress Free State and become familiar with it so you can find it when you need to. It will give you powerful relief from stress, worry, depression, insomnia and more. And it will give you the foundation for Unshakable Certainty.

We’ve developed a “Fast Acting Stress Relief Pack” with 6 proven and powerful techniques and exercises with crystal clear, step by step guided instructions on how to use them. (The Pack includes practices largely unknown in the west) They will connect you with the Stress Free State. The Pack will also

• Lead you into emotional clarity and peace, even in the middle of turmoil
• Leave you less stressed, less anxious and less depressed
• Give you more relaxed self-assurance
• Lower your toxic stress hormone levels
• Increase your anti-aging and well-being hormone levels
• Strengthen your heart and immune systems
• Let you sleep more like you used to
• Leave you more happy and more satisfied

The Fast Acting Stress Relief Pack will be available soon. To reserve your Pack now write me at drjim@MesicsTraining.com with the words “Reserve Pack” in the subject line.

An Investment That Really Pays Off—Guaranteed

You may be searching high and low for something you can invest in that could really pay off big time. Well this is one of the trickiest investment environments we’ve ever been in. But here’s a sure thing with 100% upside and no downside.

Invest in actionable knowledge about stress.

Stress is the developed world’s #1 health and quality of life problem, according to the World Health Organization. And the more I learn and the more I open my eyes-the more I think that they’ve underestimated the problem.

I liken today’s stress epidemic to the black plague. This epidemic is probably the only thing that the media understates. Studies show that stress hormones drive heart disease, cancer, diabetes, anxiety, depression and much more. We KNOW this to be true, but we continue to act as if it isn’t.

Consider what other stress experts have said:

“Chronic stress kills. People wear down. Stress is linked to the six leading causes of death….

Drs. Lyle H. Miller, and Alma Dell Smith, Senior Stress Researchers

… overexposure to cortisol and other stress hormones — can disrupt almost all your body’s processes, increasing your risk of obesity, insomnia, digestive problems, heart disease, depression, memory impairment, physical illnesses and other complications.

Mayo Clinic Staff

Stress can cause some of our most common killers – cancer, heart disease, and cerebrovascular disease. Stress-related diseases include depression, ulcers, irritable bowel syndrome, reproductive dysfunction, and the worsening of diabetes.

The Endocrine Society

“Women with high daytime stress hormone levels had reduced immunity associated with higher mortality, especially breast cancer mortality.”

David Spiegel, MD,
Stanford University Study Director

The facts about stress beg for disclosure, they are not known to the general public. The truth is that we’re not wired properly for this way of life. The speed and complexity of the way we live are doing a job on us. Studies show that up to 9 out of 10 visits to doctors are for stress related problems.

Stress isn’t just about sitting in traffic too long, financial worries and family problems. Part of our stress problem is that we don’t do enough of what we truly want and love. And our work too often lacks a loving connection to life and to other people.

It also doesn’t help today that many doctors have been transformed into drug delivery systems. That’s just one reason why doctors and hospitals are the third leading cause of death in America.

The one thing that really stresses me out is knowing that there’s a real solution to the problems of stress. A solution that will protect you and not only keep you out of harm’s way, but also save your family a lot of heartache and give you a great chance to enjoy a long, well-lived and well-loved life.

But to get that solution, you have to invest some of your time and energy in acquiring knowledge about stress. So let’s get on with it. Pony up some time and energy and let’s start growing you some real wealth.

Let me make it easy for you to get started. I’ll give you my new book Free. “The Little Black Book of Stress Relief Secrets” is right now available on the home page-for a limited time-at no charge.

Read the book and you’ll be ready for some next steps, steps that will make a huge difference in your life. “The Little Black Book of Stress Relief Secrets” will give you the real skinny on stress and some powerful tools to begin to control it.

Knowledge is power, power to control your destiny. Now that’s real wealth.

Pick up the book now. I wrote it for you. Let me know what it does for you and please let me know of any suggestions for future editions. Your feedback helps me create the best possible matierials for others.

Stress and the Insomnia Nightmare

Did you know that insomnia puts you at risk for serious health problems as well as for chronic anxiety and depression? Not getting a full night’s sleep now and then is common. But if you have chronic trouble getting to and staying asleep you need to do something about it.

But what exactly should you do? Sleep medications provide temporary relief, but not only are they habit forming, they also don’t really give you the kind of sleep you need.

Recent studies have given us a clear idea about what causes insomnia and so real solutions are possible. We’ll consider these studies just up ahead, but before we do, let’s take a closer look at the sleep problems that plague and put millions of people in jeopardy.

No Wonder We’re Tired

The fact is we sleep on average 90 minutes a night less than did our great grandparents. That’s 540 hours less sleep a year than they enjoyed. And we sleep a full two hours less than most people did 150 years ago.

Have you ever noticed that when you’re sleep deprived, you get sick more often? There’s a connection-insomnia leaves you more susceptible to infections because it weakens your immune system. Studies show that when you don’t get enough sleep, the number of the natural killer cells in your peripheral blood system goes down. And the fewer natural killer cells available in your blood, the more susceptible you are to infection.

The evidence is mounting: Getting less sleep than you were “designed for” disrupts the finely balanced system that not only keeps you healthy and energized, but that also sustains your life. For example, not getting enough sleep upsets your hormonal equilibrium and creates conditions similar to early diabetes and rapid aging.

Insomnia and Stress

The rise in insomnia problems has accompanied the rise in stress levels worldwide. The World Health Organization declared stress the #1 health and quality of life in the developed world. Consider this: In these same developed countries, the average night’s sleep has gone from 9 hours to 7.5 hours in the last hundred years. And today many people get far less than 7.5 hours.

If you want sleep better and longer, you need to reduce your stress.

Keep in mind that stress is not just about feeling wired and tired. It’s about the release of stress chemicals into your system, chemicals also known as hormones, such as cortisol and epinephrine.

Here’s the essence of the stress-insomnia story. You’re hard-wired for what’s known as “The Fight or Flight Response”, a survival mechanism that energizes you to fight or flee in the face of life threatening danger. The problem is your hard-wiring is not designed for the complexity and speed of life today.

We’re all too often on edge about work, money and relationships. We’re overscheduled, overworked and bombarded by bad news media reports 24/7. As a result your Fight or Flight Response triggers too often and stress hormones leak into your blood and tissues and linger there. And so your adrenal glands become overactive and depleted. Then you can’t sleep because parts of your mind and body are prepared to run or fight for survival, not lie down and go nighty night.

As Drs. Chrousos and Gold, two Senior National Institute of Health Scientists put it:

“In our modern society, stress…hormones continue to wash through the system in high levels, never leaving. Stress leads to serious health problems”.

And one of these problems is surely insomnia. Let’s look more closely.

Overactive and Tired Adrenals are the Culprit

Studies show that people with chronic insomnia have increased levels of stress hormones in their blood. People who regularly have trouble getting to and staying asleep suffer from persistent around the clock activation of their body’s Fight or Flight Response system with chronically overactive and worn out adrenal glands.

This adrenal gland hyperarousal is a risk factor for both medical and psychological illness and problems. It requires reversal, not medication.

Consider this study reported in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism. A group of people with insomnia were compared to a group with no insomnia. Blood was collected ever 30 minutes from members of both groups over a period of 24 hours. The findings: The levels of stress hormones cortisol and ACTH were significantly higher in the insomnia group.

Moreover, the findings were that people with the most severe sleep disturbances secreted the highest amount of stress hormones-especially at night.

In the words of the principal scientist, Dr. Vgontzas.

“This means that insomniacs are experiencing hormonal changes in their bodies, which prevents them from sleeping.”

The study also concluded that increased production of stress hormones in the 24 hour wake/sleep cycle also increases risk for depression, high blood pressure, obesity and osteoporosis.

You Must Deal With the Source of the Problem, Not the Symptom

Too often medical physicians prescribe medication for insomnia. That misses the point. The source of the problem needs to be addressed. And the source is

• stress,
• overactive adrenal glands and
• stress hormones.

The good news is there is a solution. You can sleep well again-if you learn how to do three things:

1. Prevent the unnecessary triggering of your “Fight or Flight Response

2. Support and restore your adrenal glands

3. Flush stress hormones out of your blood and tissues.

You can do this with the right knowledge, tools and training.

When stress hormones get released too often and when they are not cleared out-they seep into your blood and tissues. Once they seep in, it’s hard to flush them out, unless you know how.

Try This Now

Let me share a brief preliminary technique with you here. It’s common as a beginning to many of our MESICS©[1] Training Routines. It’s MESICS Free Release Breathing^TM. This breathing will help shut down your Fight or Flight Response and trigger a stress reducing mechanism in your body. Here’s how you do it.

Take three Free Release Breaths as follows:

• On your “in breath”-breathe in through your nose into your diaphragm

• On your “out breath”-breathe from your diaphragm out through your mouth. Just completely let go

• Don’t walk your breath out-just let it go completely “hhhaaaa”

• On the out breath sigh if you are not in public- “hhhaaa”

• If you are in public-do it quietly and discreetly

• Then tune yourself briefly to the calm, clear state at the end of your out breath. Rest there for about 7 seconds. Then repeat twice more.

• Try to maintain your connection to the calm state at the end of your out breath for as long as possible

This will give you a taste of what we call the “Stress Free State”

“Free Release Breathing” is so powerful because it helps trigger the part of your nervous system that stops the release of stress hormones.

Again, at the end of your out breath, you will feel at ease, calm and clear. Tune yourself to this experience. Once you are familiar with this practice, you can use it to reconnect to this calm, relaxed state of mind. Then, when you’re in a stressful situation, you will be able to deal with it quickly.

The Ultimate Solution to the Insomnia Problem

The ultimate solution to insomnia and to all other stress driven problems is to be able to access the Stress Free State at will. The goal is to stop your overactive adrenals from releasing stress hormones.

And so the following recommendations are merely provisional. They don’t address the source of the problem. But they can be helpful nevertheless.

• Instead of sleep medication, try a natural relaxant such as Gaba. You can find it in a health food store or on the internet.

• Try a Gaba supplement along with a calcium/magnesium supplement 30 minutes before bedtime

• Develop a good exercise program-this will reduce your stress, quiet your adrenals and help you sleep

• Learn techniques to stop worrying-once worry gets you in its grip-it will trigger your Fight or Flight Response-in error. (use the Free Release Breathing and let go of worrisome thoughts). Excessive worry and fretting can keep you drenched in stress hormones

• Don’t drink caffeine after 1 pm

• Don’t eat a lot before you go to bed

• Learn some effective relaxation exercises and techniques, including breathing, meditation and/or yoga

Most importantly–develop a plan to learn how to 1) support and restore your adrenal glands, 2) short-circuit the unnecessary triggering of your Fight or Flight Response and 3) flush stress hormones out of your blood and tissues.

It may sound real complicated, but it isn’t. And it’s well worth the effort. You will sleep well again and live a whole lot better and longer.

---

[1] M-E-S-I-C-S is an acronym for the Latin phrase: Mens Sana In Corpore Sano. It means “A Sound Mind in a Healthy Body”. MESICS® translates scientific discoveries into actionable knowledge and combines it with powerful tools and expert support and training-so you can put that knowledge to work for your health and well-being.

Personal Growth: Therapy and Choosing a Therapist

Have you ever felt stuck, confused and unsure of yourself? As if you’re in territory you have no map for and so you feel lost and uncertain without any clear sense of direction. Or perhaps you’ve felt that the bright colors in your life have begun to fade and you feel like you’re living as a character in a book someone else has written.

If you are like most people, then life will indeed send you your fair share of difficulties and situations that you can’t understand or change on your own. Trying to figure out and resolve some of your problems alone can be like trying to pick up a board you’re standing on.

That’s when psychotherapy can be incredibly valuable. Therapy can be a powerful way to get your life on track, reduce stress, solve problems and improve your health and well-being. But is it for you? Should you seek help from a psychotherapist?

MAKING THE DECISION CAN BE COMPLICATED

Making the decision to see a therapist can be difficult for a number of reasons. Let’s consider some of them together.

First, many people feel a loss of self-worth over the prospect of seeing a therapist. That’s not uncommon, especially in our culture. More than a few of us have bought into false and heroic notions about what it means to be a healthy or strong person, notions that view psychological stress and problems as signs of weakness. These ideas are nonsense—but they can be powerful nonsense.

Never assume that your psychological stress, problems or yearnings are evidence that you are lacking in any way. In truth, your difficulties can be a healthy signal that something important within you is calling for your attention. It takes intelligence, courage and character to respond to those calls.

The fact is that if we deny and avoid our emotional pain, we’ll pay a stiff price. Because if we deny our emotions, they can make us ill. And if we try to avoid our problems, they begin to set limits on what can actually happen in our life. Would you want to waste part of your life stuck in a self-image that’s too small for who you truly are?

Studies show that people who experience a successful psychotherapy not only feel better emotionally—they also have less stress and fewer life and health problems.

The same is true, by the way, for people who develop the capacity, through training, to work on their own psychology. This falls into the category of what we call “Mind-side Fitness”. More about that another time. For now, let’s get back to therapy.

If you do decide to go into therapy, you have to choose a therapist, a choice that can be a difficult task. Some suggestions: Do your best to play an active role in finding a good therapist. Become as well informed as possible. Don’t just passively accept someone else’s referral.

WHAT TO DO IN YOUR FIRST MEETINGS WITH A THERAPIST

During the initial therapy meetings, plan to learn a number of important things about your therapist. Because of your past passive roles with professionals, you might feel awkward making inquiries about a therapist’s education, training and experience. You should raise questions anyway.

If you ask questions respectfully, then a therapist should be willing and able to answer them easily. If she or he takes offense, then you know right away that you need to move on. And a therapist should be able to offer you a clear and brief answer to the question: what is psychotherapy?

There is no one correct answer. But really good therapists can usually tell you in plain English what therapy means to them. These therapists have digested their education and training into a personal vision of therapy that is well thought out, vital and alive.

It’s not a bad idea to ask if a therapist own therapy has been part of her training. Don’t ask for any details, just whether or not they’ve been in therapy. A therapists own experience in therapy is a critical part of her training. It’s hard to help someone get to a place you haven’t been to yourself.

QUESTIONS AND ISSUES YOU SHOULD CONSIDER

After you meet with a therapist, ask yourself these questions: What does it feel like to be with and talk to this person? Can I understand what they’re saying? Do I feel that what I have to say is understood in the way I meant it? Do I learn something of value during therapy sessions?

Many psychotherapy experiences begin with focused objectives in mind. For example, you may want to deal with stress or negotiate life changes such as a divorce, a marriage or a change in career. Therapy can also be an experience of uncovering and mastering habitual tendencies that leave you vulnerable to stress and recurring problems at work and in your relationships.

For some people, psychotherapy can go on for long periods as the work of therapy moves beyond the resolution of problems. Like lobsters shedding their shells that become too small to contain their growth, deep therapy involves you in the work of disengaging from your surface conditioning so that you can grow into more of who you deeply are.

You need to give a therapist the authority to work on your behalf. At times, they may challenge you to face things that are disagreeable. That’s part of what you pay them for. But they should be caring and respectful when they challenge you.

And you should never treat a therapist as an authority figure that you can’t question or challenge. And under no circumstances should you feel pressured to accept interpretations, directives or instructions that you don’t understand.

The word psychotherapy originally meant “healing of the soul or psyche”. At its best, therapy is a process of tending to and caring for our inner life. The goal is to create a “sound mind in a healthy body” and so enjoy a life that can be well lived, loved and understood.

At its best, therapy can be an exciting and courageous adventure of personal growth.