We talk about depression and anxiety a lot in our society, but many people, including doctors, nurses and probably even some psychiatrists are not that clear in their own minds what we are actually talking about. Even if we think we are clear in our own minds, we are certainly not always in agreement with each other.
A central theme of this series is that we are always responsible for our own health, not for any moral reason, but because we are the ones with the most power to influence it, and by a wide margin.
If we are going to be responsible for our own mental health, it is important that we have a clear understanding of what we mean by mental health and mental illness.
If we are not clear about this, we may struggle to find the most effective strategies for managing our problems and will run the risk of inadvertently adopting harmful coping mechanisms.
The world can be a beautiful place if we can learn to open our eyes and see it. As it is Christmas I want to share something beautiful with you. I get tears in my eyes every time I hear it. It is especially beautiful to me because it is about family, but I hope that you enjoy it too.
Merry Christmas!
The body and mind are not two separate entities, they are intricately and absolutely related to each other. Trying to separate the body and mind, thinking of some conditions as “mental health” conditions and others as “Physical health” conditions makes no sense. More to the point it is an unhelpful way of trying to understand humans and can stop us from being healthy.
Many of our problems are the result of a failure to realize that we are not children anymore. Many of us fail to understand the power that we gain as adults, or at least are unable or unwilling to exercise this power.
There is no such thing as personality. There are just patterns of thinking that we learnt as children. But when we become adults, we gain the power to choose different patterns, if we want to. Just as when we are adults, we can choose our hobbies or careers based on what suits us, rather than on what suited our parents, so too can we choose our personalities.
If we don’t, our happiness will be completely dependent on external circumstances and we will be setting ourselves up for an unhappy life, because a good proportion of the time bad stuff will be happening to us.
Probably the best way to convince yourself that you have control over your own mind is to start doing it. In this episode I am going to present a simple practical tool to help you to start managing your mind today. I often warn that there are no “quick fixes” but by practicing the thought ladder you really can have an instant impact on how you feel day to day.
I learnt about this from an excellent podcast called Unf*ck Your Brain which I highly recommend you check out.
https://unfuckyourbrain.com/
Pain is an incredibly common symptom that I see. It can be extremely debilitating and difficult to treat. The good news is that I believe that Progressive Medicine does have something to offer to people who suffer with chronic pain, and it isn’t by simply choosing not to be in pain, and it isn’t because “the pain is just in your head.”
Learning the origin of our thoughts does not in itself make us feel better. Understanding the root cause of my insecurities does not help me if I continue to feel insecure. If I continue to think bad thoughts about myself, I will continue to feel bad. If we want to feel better, we must think better thoughts.
Sadly, even that is not enough. Not only do we have to think better thoughts, we must also believe those thoughts. Learning how to think and believe helpful thoughts about yourself, on purpose, is the basis of managing your mind and the way to achieve this is through the practice of thought work.
You don’t have to be crazy to have psychotherapy, but you would be crazy not to.
Everyone should have psychotherapy.
Find out why, and how you can get involved.
Today is the first day of the rest of your life.
Don’t waste another day on needless suffering and anxiety.
Meditation works because it turns off our thoughts, many if which are negative and harmful to us. It helps us to see that the world can be a peaceful place if we stop projecting our anxieties into it.
But what if instead of simply turning off unwanted or unhelpful thoughts, we could actively replace them with welcome beneficial ones? What if we could stop believing our stories that restrict us, and harm us, and instead think and believe thoughts that allow us to thrive? What if our running commentaries could support and encourage, rather than berate and injure us?
So far in this series I have explored why Western medicine has failed to make us feel better, and why we might struggle to believe that there is a better alternative.
Well, there is a better alternative, and seeing is believing.
In this episode I’m going to explain why positive change must always start with our thoughts, and to suggest some practical tools to help you start feeling better today.