5 Habits to Move from Surviving to Thriving

Hey there, everybody, and welcome to this video on 5 Daily Habits to Move from surviving to thriving. I'm your host, Dr. Donnelly Snipes. So what's the difference between surviving and thriving? In survival mode, you're only able to do what you need to do to survive. You're just. You're barely getting by. You're just putting one foot in front of the other. You're not enjoying life, you're not throwing thriving, you're not growing, you're not flourishing, you're just getting by. Think about a plant that you planted and maybe you're not watering it and giving it what it needs or whatever. It's surviving. It's there, it's not dead yet. But it's not thriving, it's not growing, it's not getting bigger, it's not producing fruit. When you're thriving, you're empowered to use your energy to stay safe and move towards those things that are important and your rich and meaningful life. So daily habit number one, and it'll sound like a lot when we go through it, but in reality, it doesn't take that long. Daily habit number one is your safety inventory. When you wake up in the morning, when you're drinking your coffee, whatever it is that you do, first thing, do you have what you need to survive? I didn't say want. I said need. There may be a lot of things that you want, but do you have what you need to survive? Do you have adequate food, water, shelter, clothing, medical care and a safe place to sleep and be? I didn't necessarily say completely stable housing. That may not be in the cards for everybody right now. Okay, but do you have a place where you feel safe in order to be to during the day, at night? Or do you feel like you're in danger if you don't have your basic needs met? You can call United Way 211 and get referrals to social services that are available. So if you're not, if you don't have what you need to survive, you need to figure out how you can start working toward those things. So that would be a habit right there. What do I need to do today, tomorrow, the next day to start working toward a situation where I'm getting my basic needs met and you don't have to do it by yourself. Call 21 1. Reach out to a local food bank or social services and there are people there that can help you. Without the basic things you need for survival, you'll be in a constant state of fight or flight experience, HPA axis and Emotional dysregulation and have difficulty getting into your wise mind and have little energy for non essentials. So it's important, you know, if you think about Maslow's hierarchy, it's important that you recognize, you make sure that you have those base needs in order to thrive. You know, A a plant needs sunlight, A plant needs soil. A plant needs water in order to grow. Habit 2 your love and belonging inventory. Connect with yourself to recognize your worth as a person. If you feel like you're not worth protecting and supporting, it's going to be really difficult to believe that anybody else is think is going to think that you are worth being loved and supporting. So make a list or a scrapbook or a me wall that you can look at the this doesn't have to be something that takes 20, 30 minutes a day. Just work on putting this together so you have something that you can glance at and go, yeah, I'm worth it. I am lovable. And connect with your inner child who still feels scared. Let them know that you're going to be protecting them and they don't have to be strong anymore. When they were little, they may have had to be stronger than they should have had to be. And I know I said the should word. And as you went through life, that inner child would come out and fight those battles. Whenever you started feeling threatened, that inner child would come out and react in a very strong way. So start greeting and supporting that inner child. Wake up in the morning and go, all right, we are going to have a great day today. And then let them know that they do belong. And their thoughts, wants, feelings and needs are important. Let them know that they do belong. If you grew up in a traumatic environment, in a chaotic environment, you may not have felt like you belonged. So that inner child still doesn't feel like they belong. And it's important to let them know they do. They're safe. You got this now they don't have to be strong anymore. But because you're there. Habit 3. Define. And that part takes a while, but once you define your rich and meaningful life, review it on a daily basis. And I encourage people to do this as a collage. Make pictures of things that are important in your rich and meaningful life and either put it as a screensaver or on a poster board so you can look at it and and identify the things that are in your rich and meaningful life already that you can nurture and the things that you're working toward. So when you look at that collage each day, reflect on what Things on there do you already have? And how can you use your energy to nurture those people and things? And what things are you still working toward? And how can you use your energy to move toward those things? So in the morning, you're getting up, you're doing that safety inventory. You're going, all right, I'm safe. Cool. You're connecting with yourself and your inner child. You're looking in the mirror going, I'm lovable. I'm not perfect. I'm lovable. And hey there, inner child, you are, too. You belong, and we're going to have a great day. Then you move on to looking at that rich and meaningful life, and you say, all right, what do we have on the menu for today? How am I going to use my energy? Plan for it. Daily habit number four, pick your battles. People with a trauma history especially, often feel unsafe, threatened, or angry and have that hyperactive HPA axis. They may tend to act on impulse instead of on facts, and it drains a lot of energy. Think. When I talk about picking your battles, I usually use the analogy of a cell phone that has a battery that's kind of crappy. And in the beginning of the morning, you charged it up all night. It's at 100%. But if you watch videos on it all day long, it's going to be dead before lunchtime, probably. But you need it to last until you get home. So you got to pick your battles. Which videos are you going to watch and which ones aren't you going to watch? Same sort of thing with your physical energy. Being angry or anxious about things you can't control, like other people or politics or the weather. That's going to drain your energy. That's an unnecessary video that you're watching. Getting excessively angry or anxious about things that you can control, like how somebody treats you. Okay, well, remember, anger and anxiety are natural emotions. Those are to tell you that there might be a threat. Use that energy instead of dwelling on how a person treated you or being angry about how a person treated you. Think, what's the best use of my energy in this situation? Maybe it means letting them know that they hurt your feelings and, you know, it's worth actually working on that. Or maybe it's somebody who's really not worth your energy and you're just like, whatever. They must have been having a bad day. But you've got to pick your battles. Or using a lot of energy, fighting battles that serve no real purpose, like arguing with trolls online or worrying about things that are in the future. You don't know what's going to happen five minutes from now for sure, let alone what's going to happen five weeks from now. So what is going on in the present and how can you use your energy in the present to move toward your rich and meaningful life? Anger and anxiety, those natural emotions are designed to help you fight a battle that needs to be fought. So the key for habit four is just asking yourself, is this whatever this is worth using energy I could use for other things in my rich and meaningful life? And habit number five, Reflect and respond. At the end of each day, reflect on how you felt. If you felt great, cool. Respond by going, I want to do more of that. If you didn't have such a good day, reflect on it and respond to figure out how can I improve the next moment. Reflect on how you used your energy. Celebrate your progress towards your goals. Did you think about what how you were going to use your energy in the morning and then follow through with that? Cool. Celebrate it. Did you waste some energy? I think most of us do each day through behaviors that were unplanned or unnecessary or holding on to negative or pessimistic thoughts. A lot, a lot of ways we can waste energy. You don't have to be perfect. Celebrate progress in reducing waste. The frequency that you got angry. Did you get angry less often today than you did yesterday? Well, that's a win. Did you get angry less intensely today than you did yesterday? Instead of enraged, you just got ticked off? And duration. Did you stay angry for a shorter period of time? Instead of getting angry and dwelling on it for two hours, you got angry and said, you know what? Not worth my energy and let it go in two minutes. Determine if you ended up wasting energy. Determine why each situation overwhelmed your logic, response and how to best respond in the future so you don't waste that energy. How can I avoid wasting energy in the future? Why was it that this was powerful enough to attract my attention and how can I avoid that in the future? So your five habits. You're going to get up. You're going to do that safety check in. You're going to do that love and belongingness check in. Reminding yourself and your inner child that you're loving and you're lovable. Identifying your rich and meaningful life and how you want to use your energy. That'll help you get a vision. You know you're beginning with the end in mind, as Covey would say. Then you're going to choose your battles because things will get in your way as you're trying to move toward that rich and meaningful life. All right? You got to pick your battles. And then at the end of the day, learn. Learn what you did well and celebrate that and reflect on your mistakes. The key in moving from surviving to thriving is to begin feeling safe and empowered, recognizing your personal power to be safe and move forward toward your rich and meaningful life, and moving from chaos to directed action.