Self Care

You matter.
You are important.
You work hard all the time.
You are always caring for others.

You try so hard.
You do the best you can.
You want to treat others well.
You’re not sure you’re doing enough.

Take a moment.
Take a deep breath.
Take an inventory of yourself.
How do you feel underneath it all?

What would you do? What would you say?
How would you be kind? How would you care?
What does someone need who feels the way you do?

You matter, too.
You are important, too.
It’s okay for you to take a break.
It’s okay to take care of yourself.

Human Connection

We are more alike than we realize.  We are human. We are beings. We are creatures made for connection. We thrive when we love, and we are loved. We grow when we are in relationship with others.

We forget all of this. We focus on how we imagine we are different. We don’t even take the time to listen to each other. We want to be right. How can we all be right? How can each of us believe we know truth, and we believe the ‘other’ has no truth? What if we are looking at the same thing, and we are seeing it from different angles?

Do we not all love our families? Parents, do you not love your children? Children, do you not love your parents? Are there not parents and children all over the world? How do we imagine we have nothing in common?

Listening to each other, with attention, with curiosity, with acceptance, is one way we can bridge this artificial gap we have created. We are human. We are more alike than we are different.

As we learn to love ourselves, and accept ourselves, we can learn to love each other. As we learn to love each other, and accept each other, we can learn to love ourselves.

 

The Time is Now

One of the biggest mistakes I make is thinking I have more time.

Realistically, all I am guaranteed is this moment.
I don’t have yesterday. I may not have tomorrow.

My challenge is to be mindful in this moment, aware, fully alive.
My challenge is also to believe in the future, and take action now.

The choices I made in the past are part of where I am today.
The choices I make today will be part of where I am tomorrow.

I choose to live now with gratitude and joy.
I choose to to let go of things I cannot change.
I choose to look forward with hope, and make good choices each day.

Coaching

When you talk with a coach,
you are talking with someone
who will listen to you carefully.

When you talk with a coach,
you will hear wise words spilling out
from your own mouth.

When you talk with a coach,
you will choose what to talk about.
You will decide what you want to focus on.

When you talk with a coach,
you have the opportunity to recognize
you already have answers inside you.

When you talk with a coach,
you focus on what you want to change or do.
You choose what steps to take, how big, and how many.

When you talk with a coach,
you have the opportunity to feel seen and heard.
You have the opportunity to discover your own wisdom.

Helping Others

When we help others, we are also helping ourselves.

None of us is totally independent. We need other people.

When we recognize our interdependence, we can ask for help and offer help as we are able.

Surviving When You Feel Like You Can’t Go On

HOPE IS THE VOICE THAT MEETS YOU IN THE STORM, and says,
“THERE IS MORE THAN WHAT YOU CAN SEE RIGHT NOW.”

———————————————————–
Definition from OxfordLanguages
sur·vive
/sərˈvīv/
verb
verb: survive; 3rd person present: survives; past tense: survived; past participle: survived; gerund or present participle: surviving

continue to live or exist, especially in spite of danger or hardship.
“against all odds the child survived”

Similar:
remain alive

live
sustain oneself
cling to life
pull through
get through
hold on
hold out
make it
keep body and soul together
continue
remain
last
persist
endure
live on
persevere
abide
go on
keep on
carry on
stay around
linger
be extant
exist
be

continue to live or exist in spite of (an accident or ordeal).
“he has survived several assassination attempts”
remain alive after the death of (a particular person).
“he was survived by his wife and six children”


If you are currently at risk of harming yourself or someone else, Call 911 Now.


Healing

Healing may be messy.
Healing may take time.
Healing may be intentional.

Healing may come with rest.
Healing may come with laughter.
Healing may come with physical activity.

Healing may depend on care from others.
Healing may depend on caring for others.

Healing may come with creativity.
Healing may come with self-care.
Healing may come with gratitude.

Healing may come with music.
Healing may come with love.
Healing may come with joy.

Maybe healing is in the body.
Maybe healing is for the soul.
One way or another, you can heal.

ADHD is a Deficit of Executive Function, Not Attention

Those who have ADHD know this is true. Attention is everywhere except where it is ‘supposed’ to be. In fact, attention is rarely focused on the required task unless there is a sense of urgency and established consequences.  You know what to do, yet you are often unable to follow through with your good intentions.

The person who has ADHD has ‘time blindness’.  If you are this person, you understand how hard it is to be on time almost anywhere for almost any reason. Your intentions are good, and then you see something or think of something, and in your mind, you are sure you have time to get it done before you have to leave. Once again, you are rushing to meet a starting time you have already missed. Once again, you are embarrassed when you are late to an appointment, or a meeting, or work. No matter  how early you start, somehow you are almost always late.

‘Out of sight, out of mind’ is something you understand, too. You may have things out instead of put away in your home or office, because you know if you put them away, you’ll forget about them. If you are a student with a paper or project due 2 months away, it disappears into thin air until the deadline is too close to ignore. You mean to work on it every day, but without small goals, and frequent reminders, it slips right out of your mind.

Your attention is everywhere, and it is so hard to pay attention and focus when someone is talking to you. You notice this. The people who want your attention notice it, too. It may be causing problems in a relationship. Maybe you fidget, or doodle, or make notes, or think about something else that passes through your mind. You don’t mean to not pay attention.

You are very sensitive to how angry and critical and disapproving people seem to be when you don’t follow through. It’s not that you wanted to let people down. It just happened. Then, it happened again, and again, and again.

You’re not a bad person. You know what to do. You simply have a brain that has difficulty taking you from knowing what to do, to taking the necessary action to accomplish your intended goal in the way you want to do it. You may feel very bad about yourself. You may feel like a failure when you don’t follow through, or meet expectations, or pay attention, or manage your life in the way you think you should.

It’s okay. You are okay. There are things you can do, steps you can take, to begin to follow through on what you want to do, wish to do, and intend to do.