Yes And: Techniques for Handling Conflicting Feelings
- HeardinLondon
- 1 day ago
- 4 min read
Spam Filter For Your Brain - Episode 188
One of the things that I don't think we're really taught to comprehend is the idea that we can hold conflicting thoughts.
It's something that I certainly was never taught at school. It's something that in everyday politics, possibly since Brexit and beyond, there is an idea of right or wrong, good or bad, very binary, you're either with me or you're against me.
And when these dialogues are so frequently like this in general populist conversations, it can be really easy to reflect that in the way that we talk to ourselves.
And I think there's probably many areas that I personally hold conflicting views, and I would be guessing that there might be a few for you too.
So for example, I can hold the thought that all bodies are worthy whilst also occasionally walking past a mirror and criticising myself. Not saying that's the only thought that I have, and I do have some amazing tools to be able to interrupt some of this dialogue. I can feel like I don't want to spend my entire life working. And also tell myself I haven't done enough today and I really should spend my entire life in front of my emails. I can tell myself that I really do deserve rest and that I should be taking more leisure time and more ease and more care of my body, and also think that I'm lazy and slovenly and should be doing more.
These narratives can just come up at the same time, and it doesn't mean that one is more true than the other. You might choose that one is a belief and a value system that you want to hold. But being able to hold the complexity of the fact that both of these things can pop up in your brain is a really useful skill to be able to notice and then decide which path you want to go down.
And this week, I wanted to offer you some disruptors. So when you notice a thought which feels a little bit sticky or a little bit painful, or you feel when you repeat it to yourself, it's causing you some suffering, that you can have something which just gets your brain spinning in some different directions.
So one of the things that I like to ask myself when a thought that comes up that's like, "ooh, that isn't something that I would say to somebody else, that isn't something that aligns with my politics", I ask myself, "what else could be true?" What else could be true here? And sometimes I get a pen and paper, and sometimes I write those things down.
A shortened version of that, and it can be really good in conversation, especially if you're in conversation with someone who doesn't necessarily agree with you, that might sometimes be yourself, you can add in the really careful use of, " Yes, and..." And what else could be possible there? Yes, I can criticise myself in the mirror, and I know that I don't align with that, and I don't do it as often as I used to, and I'm deciding to challenge that quite often.
Yes, and I notice that I'm giving myself hassle for the amount of emails that are in my inbox. Yes, and I also, , allow myself to finish at the time that I agreed to, don't overstretch my boundaries, and don't spend my entire life thinking that my worth is dictated by having inbox zero.
That "yes, and" can be a really crucial addition to what's going on.
And there is a great phrase that I learned from Melissa Tiers, who's a incredible hypnotherapist. Not sure she would call herself that. She'd probably call herself all kinds of witchy words. And she taught me the phrase:
What am I seeing that's not that? What else is there that is not that? It's turning that phrase inside out and so I can go, okay, so maybe I feel like I should have shown up for my friend more. Maybe I should have gone to their birthday party even though I was feeling really tired. What else is there that's not that?
They had a nice party anyway. My friend cares about me enough to have invited me. Aren't I lucky to have people that I love and care, and access and means to be able to get to an event like that if I were to be able to? Aren't I incredibly fortunate to live a lifestyle where when my body is ill, I'm able to rest, and that I have a bed and a duvet and a roof over my head in order, to rest in?
What am I seeing around me that is not that? It expands out this view. It takes things from this, claws in microcosm, everything focusing on the pain point, to opening you up to the wider universe, to yourself, to all of the other possibilities, and I believe more into the interconnectedness of it all.
It just takes our small insular daily pain into a, "oh, yeah, and this is what it's all about, actually". Reminding ourselves of all of the things that got us here in the first place.
So just some really breezy, disruptive questions today, leaving you with tools that hopefully you can use and take with you.
Sometimes it's good to write them down, sometimes you can use them in conversation, sometimes they're just things that you can mull through your head as you're staring out of a bus window.
Hope that it's useful.
If you find my podcast useful, I would be so grateful if you could just pass it on to one friend who you feel might benefit from hearing this today, 'cause that's how I get these messages out into more people's ears, through kind and generous words of mouth, and sharing on social media, and other way that you wanna pass these messages on.
I'd be so grateful. I'll speak to you next week
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