My Best Self 101 Blog
Considering what we know about the importance of supportive relationships to health and happiness, Gottman’s research on couple relationships is gold. We know, on average, that married people are more healthy both physically and mentally. In fact, a person’s romantic relationship affects their health just as much as diet and exercise.
Between pandemic updates and politics, I've found myself brain-fogged and on edge more than I care to admit. Instead of living in the present, I've let my mind get carried away with doomscrolling and imagining every possible worst-case scenario. It's not healthy to spend all of your cognitive energy trying to understand something that can't be understood. But how do you go from doom and gloom to savoring life again when there's just so much to worry about?
Put simply, self-efficacy is the amount of belief that you have in your own capabilities. Whether it be public speaking, making a friend, or creating a business, we instinctively set goals to seek personal growth. We cannot attain these goals without believing in ourselves. Sure, it may seem cliché. You’ve heard “believe in yourself,” “be confident,” and “trust in yourself” predictably plastered into your perceptive field, right? Even so, we need such confidence now more than ever.
So, according to Campbell, we like to read, watch, and learn about heroes because their mythical quest stands in for the psychological journey that we take every day. At the same time, Campbell points out that we are usually unaware of this journey, so we often take steps in the wrong direction. We are the detoured hero, distracted by side quests that prevent us from achieving our ultimate self-development goals.
So, when you are struggling with feeling like you need to be perfect, think about why you are feeling that way. Is it for other people? Are you setting goals and trying to accomplish things so that you will gain the satisfaction of others? If you are, try setting different types of goals that focus on becoming better at something for yourself rather than for others.
Instead of measuring our success by the number of things we finish and the destinations we reach, why don’t we learn to enjoy the process and journey of becoming who we want to be as we move closer towards those life-long goals of discovering what matters most to us? This is what describes a values-driven life.
Most of us interact with our thoughts and feelings subconsciously. We are engaging with them in some way, but we aren’t actually paying attention to them. They seem to spring up suddenly and dictate how we act. An interesting idea in mindfulness is that there is merit to consciously engaging with our thoughts and feelings. We can look at them as options to engage with.
And that’s what meditation does for you. It trains your brain to observe without reacting until the puppy has calmed down, everything is processed and you can now act from your values instead of Kody running the show. Imagine what different choices you would make if you were less reactive. Personally, I would eat differently, have better relationships, and generally live from a place of greater ease, to name a few.
So the holidays this year are definitely...weird. Due to the circumstances with COVID, our Christmas traditions and family gatherings are being cancelled or altered in some way. For many people (me included), the holidays are a somewhat hectic but joyful time of year, and having COVID continue into December seems to be robbing this otherwise difficult year of its happiest time. Our past traditions are absent this year, leaving what feels like a void in our lives.
