Category Archives: Life Skills

Help Emotionally Troubled Loved Ones by Sitting with Them in Their Emotions

Life Skills, Mental Health
If you have someone you care about who is going through a difficult time and you don’t know how to get through to them, here’s how: Be present with them and spend time with them.  Don’t spend brain power solving their issues. Don’t spend energy telling them what they should do without them asking you for that.  Don’t take the initiative, the free will, the power to control their own life away from them.
What someone needs when they’re in an emotionally charged state is for someone else to absorb that emotional energy through active listening.
A friend recently showed me a South Park Episode about suicide (Season 21 Episode 2: Put It Down) and in it, near the end of the show, there’s two scenes that are really educational on how to help a friend.
A good friend doesn’t judge, doesn’t criticize, doesn’t problem solve. A good friend just sits with the person and listens and feels the emotions that the other person is feeling so that the person doesn’t feel alone and scared anymore because there’s someone else together with that person.  Sit in the emotions with the other person, ask them “how do you feel.” “How else do you feel?” “Wow, that sounds scary, how do you cope?” “That sounds hard, I can understand why you’re feeling this way.”  Let them express to you all that they are feeling, and listen. Sit and listen. Feel bad with them.  Keep feeling bad with them until they have said all they want to say about the topic (it may take a very long time) but only after they have been allowed to discharge all of their emotions will they be able to calm down, relax, and think clearly again.
The order of health priority in all situations is:
Emotional -> Mental/Logic -> Beliefs/Spiritual/Psychological -> THEN Physical Health -> Society (Finances/Career/Relationships).
First help your loved one with their emotions.
Then you can discuss the logical solutions and actions you can take to problem solve.
Then ensure that they can accept the logic you discussed, and have alignment between their Beliefs and the Logic. If they don’t, they may revert back to an Emotional state.
Only after all 3 Healths (Emotional, Mental, Beliefs) are healed can you then focus on Physical Health or Society Health.  This is why when you say “Go get some sleep” or “Go exercise” or “Take better care of yourself” to someone who is emotionally uncomfortable, they get mad at you. It’s because those statements do not help until you have discharged them emotionally for your loved one. .
To find out when more life education writing is released, subscribe on the side! Follow on Twitter, on Facebook, on Google+, on Tumblr.

3 Keys to Goal Setting Success

Life Education, Life Skills

Goal setting isn’t easy.  Setting a goal is easy.  What is goal setting?  It’s not just picking a goal.

Goal setting is about picking

  1. The right goal
    – How big is this goal?  Is it going to be 3 steps over a few days, or a hundred step over months or years?
    – What category should you set your goal in? Should it be in art, math, relationships, etc?
    – How likely are you going to be able to succeed at this goal?  1%? 90%?
  2. For you
    – Why did you decide to set this goal? Is it because parents/society? Is it because you want to achieve it? is it because you want to get something after you achieve it?
  3. At that time.
    – Why now? Why not take a different goal for now and do this goal later?
    – How does this goal fit into your current life plans and strategy?

Other good questions to ask about your goal are:

  • What is the follow up goal after you finish this goal? What does achieving this goal lead into next?
  • What is your Goal Plan?   (Next post = goal planning!) How do you specifically in detail plan to achieve your goal?

This post is part of AttemptedLiving’s Life Education Curriculum, a collection of core knowledge everyone should have.

To find out when those posts, and other life education writing, are released, subscribe on the side! Follow on Twitter, on Facebook, on Google+, on Tumblr.

How to Recover From Abuse

Emotional Intelligence, Life Skills, Mental Health

Here is a collection of tips that I found useful when recovering from abuse. Please comment below with any additional tips to share!

First recognize the state you’re in: you’re weak in every way.

You are not emotionally healthy enough to handle emotions because you’re emotionally weakened from the abuse you’ve gone through, so you’re likely to either be hurt easily by everything, or you’re likely to harden up and ignore or suppress any emotions you might feel. As much as possible, stay conscious of your emotionally weakened state, as it will help you make good decisions like avoiding confrontation/emotionally taxing events, or avoiding decisions that you normally wouldn’t make when healthy.

When you seek help, be selective and choose only people who make you feel better.  If someone doesn’t help you feel better about the abuse you’ve gone through, check if you have the energy to inform them. If so, do so. If not, end the conversation and try to find another person to help.  Most people are not trained to provide emotional therapy, so don’t be surprised if your friends and family fail to help.  Do make it known that you want help so that people can offer it to you and you can accept it if helpful.

Spend time on self care as much as you can.

Realize that you are likely to lapse greatly in this area, so do your best, but stay conscious of your progress and efforts at all times.

Health Checklist: I Feel Bad What Should I do?

Take your time, but also take as much action as you can bear.

A lot of people will tell you to ‘get over it’ and ‘move on’ and this is half helpful and half insulting so take it with a grain of salt.  The positive way of looking at these comments is that the intention is to help you feel better, it’s how they know how to show care for you. However, it’s often the case that their delivery is insensitive and hurtful, so ignore them if necessary.  Use them as a reminder that you should try as much as possible to take action, even if it’s a little bit. Get out of bed. Walk around. Shower. Wipe the table. Clear off the desk.  Read and clear an email or two.  Do something productive and take action.  And when you feel like you can’t do anything anymore, rest. If you need rest, take it.  When you’re ready, you can move on. When you’re ready, you can get over it.

Be honest with yourself on your recovery. Don’t let insensitive people pressure you to suppress your emotions before you’ve had the appropriate amount of time necessary to process them.  Take your time.

Do Things That Make You Happy!

Whatever it is, do what makes you happy until you can recover!

To find out when more life education writing is released, subscribe on the side! Follow on Twitter, on Facebook, on Google+, on Tumblr.