Boundaries And Clarity

Human beings have highly analytical minds, but just because you are able to think as much as you do, doesn’t mean that it is healthy.

I’m sure you have noticed how much you tie yourself up in knots, going round in circles, your thoughts running roughshod around your head. You spend agonising hours thinking and rethinking the same things and, in the end….you have achieved nothing!

You get completely wrapped up in worrying about what might happen in the future and about all the things you could have done better in the past.

You go down rabbit holes of resentment, outrage, anger…

When is it that you’re thinking all this? Yup, in the present…the only time you ever actually have.

Forever is composed of nows.

Rather than enjoying all the fun, opportunities, beauty and love that today has to offer, you drive yourself nuts following the thought train that’s chugging through your mind in a continuous loop. It’s bad enough losing your precious now but because you’re in the overthinking habit, your mind carries on with this thankless task when you’re trying to sleep too!

These are just a few of the things you’ll notice, because of this examining and re-examining of your negative thoughts and memories.

While all this endless analysing is going on, you’re letting life pass you by.

You can’t change anything that happened before this moment, with any amount of thought so it is completely unnecessary.

The things you’re worrying about in the future almost certainly won’t happen and if they do, you’ll cope with them a lot better if you’re not an anxious mess.

Your head is so full of all the stuff that you are slow and inefficient.

You become emotionally and physically ill.

It’s absolutely exhausting.

Planning for the future is certainly worth your time as is learning from the past, but not the cyclical, going over and over and over something that there simply isn’t an answer for. The type of thoughts you may have been experiencing are limitless but these may be some of them.

How will I cope with all my expenses and outgoings?

How will I deal with my change in circumstances?

I’m not being a consistent, wise and peaceful role-model for my children.

My stress is affecting my children really badly.

I can’t face meeting people and having to look happy.

I’m sure my friends talk about me behind my back.

I’m failing.

These types of thoughts cause you a great deal of harm. Stress symptoms include: insomnia, low energy, heartburn, headaches, IBS, aches, pains, muscle tension, rapid heartbeat, chest pain, raised blood pressure, frequent colds and other infections, repetitive habits, loss of sexual interest or ability, skin conditions, asthma, skin rashes, and the list continues…

You know that stress has a detrimental effect on your health but what you may not know is that stress is simply overthinking; using your mind too much, for too long, too often.

Stress is overthinking

Chronic stress is overthinking

Anxiety is overthinking

Panic disorder is overthinking

OCD is overthinking

Need I go on?

I am not, in any way, belittling these illnesses, I am just showing that once you understand how to stop your thoughts controlling you, any unpleasant symptoms will be alleviated.

You no doubt overthink so often that you believe there is no other way to be and that you have no control over it; overthinking is a habit and not a good one.

The great news is that this habit, like all habits, can be overcome.

When you kick the overthinking habit, you will find you have, not only less stress, but actually more time. You may think that overthinking doesn’t eat up time but the poor way in which you function, when your thoughts are running amuck is, in fact, very significant.

When my clients have been through my program they tell me how much more easily they now cope with their daily chores, child rearing, careers or whatever they were totally swamped by when they first came to see me. They tell me that they now have time for hobbies, for fun, for love, for life.

Just as with any other of your stories, you can choose to gently refuse to be sucked into your overthinking. It may seem difficult at first, some overthoughts might be trickier than others to ignore and some days might be easier than others. Once you get the hang of it, though, and you certainly will, you’ll find yourself in a blissfully peaceful space that has been vacated by all the offending thoughts. In this place, you will have clarity of thought as well as access to your inner wisdom; decisions will be much easier to make. The enormous relief of your thoughts no longer having control over you, the peaceful state of mind you’ll achieve and the absence of physical symptoms will be the priceless reward for your perseverance.

Once you create a space by not focusing on your 50-80,000(!) thoughts a day, love will naturally flood back into it. Remember that love is your natural state…and you have been taking yourself away from it.

You have been making your life very hard, and getting frustrated, hurt and angry in the process. Happiness, peace and love were in you the whole time, but your head was so full of needless thoughts and analyses, you didn’t have the clarity to see it.

I like the acronym KISS – keep it slow and simple. Less is usually more, don’t you think?

The aim is to free your mind of clutter and be present in this moment….stop over complicating everything and remember you are a human being not a human doing. Allow yourself to drop down into your space of peace.

When stillness and love have become a way of life, there will be nothing to do and you will simply be. Until you get there, there are countless ways to actively change your thought patterns and reduce the noise in your head; some of my favourites are stroking a pet, sitting quietly with music, walking in nature, drawing and yoga. Whatever you decide to do, do it mindfully. Concentrate only on what you’re doing, gently bringing straying thoughts back to your chosen activity.

Meditation

Making time for relaxation is essential to both your physical and mental health and meditating can be even better because it takes relaxation to a deeper level.

Meditation will help you move away the mental chatter and calm the usually continual busyness that fills your mind so that you can connect with, and get to know, areas of yourself that are generally hidden beneath the chaos. It will enhance the tranquility, clarity and wisdom you need in order to enjoy your relationships….and indeed everything else in your life.

This is not about trying to empty your mind, which is impossible, but rather about focussing. The only ‘emptying’, is of the myriad of unnecessary worries you live with daily.

Maybe you already meditate, but let me make sure you understand it and use it correctly.

Meditation has to be learned like anything else. It can be a little tricky, at first, to tame the playfulness of your mind and once you achieve it, to stay in that serene space for any length of time…but with patience, you will achieve relaxation and inner calm.

You don’t need to meditate for more than a few minutes so don’t worry if you find any longer than that difficult. It’s better to do five minutes a few times a week than try and maybe fail, to do half an hour in one go.

You might find it helps you to choose the same time and place each day but I don’t tend to impose rules like that on myself because then I might find excuses not to do it; if I’m not at home or I miss my meditation time, it would be easy not to bother that day. Some people may tell you that a special posture is necessary but many of us will find our knees prevent us from achieving a prescribed position. I also often hear that you must sit with both feet on the ground; that has actually never made sense to me when we might be on the second floor of a building! Just make sure that you are in a comfortable position in which you can sit for some time. You may even like to meditate lying down. The only drawback of this is that you may fall asleep….but what a lovely sleep you’ll have!

However you meditate, practise is the key and when you manage to shut out external distractions, you will be rewarded. Meditation is a wonderful…almost magical experience.

Once you have learned to relax, you will be amazed how much more meaning your life has. You and those around you will love how calm you are; how much better you cope with once perceived triggers.

There is nothing at all scary or unscientific about meditation and I’d like you to know that I am a qualified and experienced hypnotherapist so understand how trance works; please know that you’re safe in my hands. A lot of people, including me, like to understand what is actually happening in their brain during meditation. When you relax, your brain waves become shallower…more so as you relax further. These waves can be measured in hertz by an electroencephalogram (EEG).

You can meditate by yourself in silence or with music or other sounds. At first, a guided meditation, in which a voice talks you through it, will be easier for you.

Please check with your GP if there is any medical reason why you shouldn’t participate in this form of relaxation and if there is, simply relax away the stresses of everyday life in one of the other ways.

Please complete 3.1 Quit overthinking now! before listening to this meditation.

How amazing would it be to know, one hundred percent, if you could trust all your decisions? You can!

All you need to do is learn how to recognise if you’re in a grounded state.

When you’re grounded, you think rationally from a peaceful place and any feeling will be reliable. This knowledge is life-changingly useful; it means you can easily check if you are making a good decision.

If you don’t feel grounded, simply wait till your mood naturally normalises before deciding on anything important.

Thoughts are transitory, they will come and go; you don’t need to do anything to change your thoughts, they will change all by themselves. Thoughts only hang around because we focus on them.

When you are in a grounded, peaceful mood, you have wide and clear vision and can see that your options and resources are plentiful; you will know that there is no need to rush into anything. Here you can trust our thinking.

When your feelings are not peaceful, you cannot rely on your thoughts.

It isn’t just the feelings you think of as negative that will show you’re in an ungrounded state; remember the crazy infatuated feeling when you couldn’t think straight?

Indications you’re not grounded :

everything seems urgent

you don’t have many options and all of them end badly

there are no helpful resources available to you

you’re using words like ‘should’, ‘ought’ and ‘not fair’

Indications you are grounded :

you know you have plenty of time

you have lots of great options

there is lots of help around you

you feel empowered and calm

The words ‘deserve’ and ‘expect’ are helpful to look out for too. They can show that you’re ungrounded if you are using them because you’re feeling indignant, resentful or fearful in any way.

Get used to recognising whether you are coming from a place of love or a place of fear. Recognise the peace, the joy, the okayness, the feeling of coming home. Learn to actively choose this feeling as much as possible until you have retrained your thoughts to do it naturally.

People ask me what I do when I get really angry or upset…how I manage to step back and let go. The honest answer is that I don’t get angry or upset any more. My neural pathways just don’t take that route. I now understand that not loving some of the things people do or say is no reason to get upset.

I like to imagine my neural pathways as well trodden path in a field of long grass. When I first started realising I had a choice whether or not to react in the same old way, I visualised wading through the long green stems in my mind, making a brand new route. It was difficult at first because the grass was long, and awkward to struggle through, but the more I used that path, the easier it got. By now, the old path has fully grown over and I don’t have to think what to do any more, my new path is comfortable and easy.

I still feel the array of emotions I always did, I’m still human, but now I have the firm knowledge that I need not follow any of them, subserviently, if I choose not to.

At first, I found I was only able to choose my pathway in situations that weren’t very emotive. I was able, for instance, to choose not to follow my thoughts when I felt irked that my husband made his coffee, milk first (who even does that?!). Once I started being able to choose my reactions to less important things, it wasn’t long before my confidence grew and I started gaining success with bigger upsets too.

I still slipped into old habits occasionally, but I was losing fears and insecurities and getting more self-assured and much happier all the time.

Whilst I waited for my natural, rational and loving thoughts to return, I did my best to remember that I didn’t need to buy into my thoughts and that things didn’t need to get unpleasant in the way they had always done before. I tried to notice when I was caught up in my poor quality thinking, and when others were.

I remember having one of the same old altercations with my long-suffering husband, and knowing, from what I’d already grasped, that whilst it felt completely true to me, that he was so obviously in the wrong, I was only feeling my own thoughts. It was a big step for me.

Sometimes, especially at the beginning, you will be pulled back into your stories, because you are human, so please don’t judge yourself…simply observe with mild interest or even humor…like you’re watching them on the television…and avoid making decisions until you’re grounded again.

Your thoughts will soon be re-trained and you will be free.

In a pool of calm, you will be connected to limitless wisdom and clarity and be able to deal with any situation with kindness and confidence. Decisions made from a clear and loving head-space will always be far more efficient than ones born of fear and confusion.

Once you realise the true nature of thought, you are free to calmly decide what is best for you in any and every situation.

Gratitude

One of our most grounding emotions is gratitude.

As I guess you have been struggling with stress in its various forms for some time, you may have become too insecure to surrender completely to the feeling of gratitude…too defensive to love freely.

When you choose love, you cannot help but be compassionate toward yourself and others. You can stop yourself being sad, angry, defensive or any other feeling you don’t like, by simply being kind to yourself and grateful for what you have.

Rather than thinking about what you haven’t got in your life, and putting yourself in a place of lack and hurt, try to concentrate on all the things you do have. This is what my grandma called counting your blessings; my grandmother was a very wise woman.

It’s very easy to get sucked into worried thoughts about how you should have a better life, should be able to stop being stressed, but with your new found control you will quickly be able to remind yourself that you can be peaceful and happy, always, isn’t that awesome?

Shifting your perspective to one of gratitude happens quickly, once you remember to meet life with love and kindness whenever you can. It may be hard, at first, to give kindness or anything else to others, when you might feel you don’t have enough love for yourself, but it’s sooo worth it.

Feeling grateful for everything in your life, and letting people know how precious they are to you, can, and will, become your way of life….second nature. You will grow to feel very comfortable with, and happy to show your love, knowing that rather than taking away your power, it adds to it. Love will replace all the feelings you didn’t enjoy.

Gratitude = happiness

You cannot be genuinely grateful and unhappy at the same time; it isn’t possible. I don’t mean grudgingly grateful…I mean the gentle and pure gratitude that comes from a loving place. The thankfulness that makes you feel warm inside.

Gratitude is the key to all you wish for.

So you now know how to trust yourself…but can others trust you?

There can be quite a lag between changing how you react and being trusted to react well. Don’t worry, soon people around you will know that you will always be rational and fair; they will come to trust that you will remain calm…that you are consistently and continuously kind and loving.

Understand that people will need a little time to see that they can rely on your reactions and don’t be surprised or upset when they still expect you to behave how you used to…it won’t take too long.

Some days you’ll feel very positive and grateful about your life and everything in it…some days you won’t. Start getting used to observing your changing thoughts and feelings, without judgement, and recognising if you’re in a space to trust yourself.

Don’t think of this as an exercise…think of it as a new way of life.

Once you learn to love yourself, you realise that needing anyone else is giving away the key to your own peace and happiness. It is also putting a very great responsibility onto people…it doesn’t feel nice to have to be someone’s everything.

You may have had family, friends or lovers who have expected this from you?

When you don’t accept and love yourself, you need others because you believe they can make you happy and, unfortunately, this is doomed to fail…you know now, that no one or thing can make you happy; only you can.

A symbiotic partnership of codependency, can exist, between friends or lovers. This is where both parties believe they couldn’t manage without the other, but it would be nowhere near as fulfilling and beautiful as a relationship between two people who love themselves and each other with no limits or conditions.

Many people believe that however exhausting it is to love with mutual intensity and all consuming need, it is simply how love works. They think that loving each other is all either partner needs, that everything else is superfluous; that every second of every minute of every day is to be given to each other. This is very sad because it means all other friendships, career, hobbies or anything else in their lives can only be, at best, extremely poor seconds. Think of the missed opportunities!

This rule some people have written for themselves isn’t always terribly practical because when their loved one has to concentrate on anything other than them, like work commitments, family duties, social obligations and what have you, they feel lonely, jealous, crushed, frightened and insecure.

I’m sure you see how dysfunctional this is. Yet it isn’t an unusual story at all, I often have clients with similar rules, wondering why they’re still miserable. You may be able to see aspects of what I’ve said, in your own relationships.

The rules you write for yourself feel like fact and therefore unchangeable. Yet they are just things you’ve made up or appropriated. As you have created them, you can choose to change them whenever you like!

What I once didn’t understand, was that when I was desperate to be my lover’s everything, I was craving the love, nurturing and acceptance that only I could give myself.

Happiness is only and always an inside job.

People who are needy will not be able to have fulfilling relationships with anyone, especially with someone who accepts and loves themselves because that person will feel smothered by their attention craving.

Needy people can, unfortunately, only have codependent, and unsatisfactory relationships.

I understand that the idea of detachment can be very scary. How can someone claim to love you without needing you? How can it be real love if it isn’t passionate and overwhelming?

I can’t tell you how amazing it is when you comprehend that real love is accepting everything exactly the way it is, without wanting or needing to change it. Real love doesn’t need constant proving…constant checking. Real love feels natural and comfortable; it offers and allows the

freedom to be fulfilled within and outside the relationship. Real love is simple, gentle and beautiful.

As soon as there’s a possibility of permanence, it’s trickier to detach, so learning to love without attaching, can be done in stages to make it easier. You will find it much simpler with things you know won’t last, when you can see their temporary nature. You probably don’t have too many issues with letting go of daylight, summer, weekends, holidays, flowers… You could then extend that attachment-less love to your favourite pair of jeans, places you love to shop or visit, your car and home.

You can learn to love yet let go when your jeans finally fall apart, your beloved shops close or move away, your vehicle needs replacing or you have to down or upsize your house.

It always feels more difficult to let go of attachment to your friends…to be comfortable with your BFF having other friends and enjoying pastimes without you. Yet there is no real difference is there? Your friends love you because you are loveable and you’re even more lovable when you give them space. They don’t need to be tethered to you, they have chosen and want to be your friend…of their own free will.

I personally wouldn’t want any type of relationship with someone who is only there because they can’t face the consequences of leaving. Would you?

Once you have meaningful and healthy friendships…..it isn’t such a big step to being happy with your partner, who, as well as loving you, has and values their own friends and hobbies.

Soon, you and your partner will be able to enjoy activities without each other, and feel secure about that. You will both be much happier because you’ll feel free within your relationship to grow and learn.

Are you maybe seeing yet that you don’t need anyone or anything to complete you or make you happy?

Revisit 3.3a until you can love totally without attachment.