Psychological Flexibility 6 Weeks to a Happier You

You. I'd like to welcome everybody to today's presentation on integrative behavioral health care. I'm your host, Dr. Donnelly Snipes. This is part of the six weeks to a Happier, Healthier you series. Today we're talking about psychological flexibility. Psychological flexibility is exactly what it sounds like. It means being able to get outside of the box to think about things from multiple perspectives, to consider the big picture instead of having that tunnel vision. And we're going to talk about some ways to start doing that. The benefits of psychological flexibility, like the benefits of a lot of things that we're going to talk about, is that it can help you regulate your HPA axis. If you are able to get outside the box, you can reduce some of your stress, you can reduce your threatening perceptions of things, and you can have a more relaxed presence. You can feel physically healthier, which is going to contribute to increased immunity, reduced pain, you know, all kinds of physical benefits. Affectively, psychological flexibility helps us be happier and helps us recognize that our distressful emotions are there for a reason, but we don't have to hold on to them. We don't have to nurture them and carry them around with us. Cognitively, psychological flexibility helps us be. Drum roll, please. More flexible. It helps us consider multiple different perspectives, which can help us be more productive, more creative, and able to adapt to situations more easily. Environmentally, psychological flexibility, like a lot of other things, just helps us be happier and healthier, which attracts more positivity into our environment. And interpersonally, psychological flexibility improves our relationships because if we are better rested, in less pain, healthier, more energetic, happier, and able to see things from multiple perspectives, guess what? It often helps our relationships. The first thing we want to do in psychological flexibility is define a rich and meaningful life. And I encourage you to do this with pictures and narratives. I'm going to give you some brief examples as we go through, but it can be helpful to define the people, things, experiences, and, you know, health quality that are important in your rich and meaningful life. The reason for that is because it helps us figure out, you know, how do I want to use my energy, how do I want to use my time in order to help me have the happiest, healthiest, richest quality of life possible for me. So the first thing you want to do is define the people, things, experiences, and health quality that's important in your rich and meaningful life. And I suggest that you get. You can go get a piece of cardboard, you can get a piece of poster paper, poster board, paper, whatever you want to do. So you can make a collage and create pictures for each person, thing, experience, or health status that is important in your life. And then with that, you're going to create a narrative describing in your rich and meaningful life, what will your interactions with those people, what were your. Will your relationships with those people look like, and why is that important? What are the things that are important and why? What are the experiences that are important and why? You see where we're going with this. So you define it not only with pictures, but also words. So you have the picture. And what I have, my clients do is write the narrative and put it underneath the picture. If you do it like you're going to see now in a PowerPoint, then obviously you can be a little bit more creative with where you display the narrative versus the picture. So, for example, in my rich and meaningful life, you know, the big picture, where I want to go, what makes my life rich and meaningful? My daughter is there, of course, and I would start by describing a great relationship with my daughter would look like. You know, what types of activities would we do, what types of communication would we have, and what would I look forward to that's going to help me figure out where I want to go? And once we figure that out, then we can figure out how to get there. My son, you know, my son is very different from my daughter, but he's a very important person in my life. So a great relationship with him looks like. I mean, they have very different interests, very different temperaments. So the things we do may be different. So, for example, with him, I would like to continue henceforth and forever more, if at all possible, going hiking at least once a month and spending quality time at least once a week. He really enjoys the Bible studies we do together. So I enjoy. And I would like to continue to do those. So that is sorting, starting to describe a little bit more about what my relationship. I would like my relationship to look like with him in the future. And of course, if he gets married, you know, has kids, whatever, I may have to adjust those things. But it is important for me to start out figuring out, you know, ideally, what would I like, and then from there I can adjust as life happens. The farm. The farm is important to me. I love growing my own food. I love being food independent as much as possible. In the future, I would like to have a pair of mini Jersey cows. Oh, my gosh, they are the most gorgeous little things in the world. But mini jerseys produce enough for a backyard or a homesteading farmer produce enough milk. I don't need 8 gallons of milk a day, so I don't need a full size jersey. But with the addition of the mini jerseys to our cows and our duck or to our chickens and our ducks, we would essentially be entirely food self sufficient, which would be really awesome to be liberated from having to rely on grocery stores, from having to rely on food supply. And I would know exactly where it was coming from. So that is one of the things that's important to me, to be able to have healthy, organically grown food and food from happy animals. We, our chickens are our friends. We only use them for eggs. But I like to know that they're happy and you know, they're not cooped up. But that's just me. So those things are important to me. What I eat, what I put in my body, where it comes from and how it impacts the land. Hiking is an experience that's important to me. I love hiking. I love going out into nature, seeing animals, seeing just being able to relax in the woods, in the forest. I grew up down in Florida. The beach, you know, is not my thing anymore. I'm beached out. But I love being in the forest and being able to hike and that is also great exercise. So it's important to me for a lot of different reasons. And I would, you know, if I were doing this for real, I would spell those out. And I'd like to continue to go hiking at least once a month. Ideally, I'd love to be able to do it with my dogs. Our dog Brewster really loves to hike, so being able to take him is a bonus because I know it helps him be happy. Which takes us to animal rescue. I have been doing animal rescues since 1990 and it is been an important part of my life for a lot of different reasons. In my rich and meaningful life, I will continue to foster at least one animal at all times. And during spring, when we have a lot of orphan puppies and kittens, you know, bringing, bringing those on, you know, one litter at a time. I can't handle multiple litters because you got to get up throughout the night and feed them. But animal rescue is always going to be an important part of my life. I've always wanted to get trained as a wildlife rehabilitation specialist. So that's another experience that's important to me. But that's one of those things that you have to do a really like an 18 month internship, which is great, you know, you need the training. But I don't have the time for it right now. So it's going to be Important for me to get to a place where I have time to do some of those things. The farm, you know, if I get cows, that's going to take more time. Going hiking takes time. There are a lot of things that are really important to me that, that take time and I'm going to have to figure out how to apportion my time. And finally taking my grandkids or if I don't end up having grandkids, my foster grandkids. On adventures. I loved going to the museums and going to the wildlife sanctuaries with my kids when they were little. And I really look forward to being able to do that again in the future. Those are just a few of the things. Oops. And maintaining good health. I need good health. So I'm around and able to do everything else that we've talked about with my family, the rescue, the farm. So good health is really important to me. Once you go through. And obviously there's more, there are more things that are important to me in a rich and meaningful life than what I just listed. But I didn't want to go through all of those while we were here. But you can get an idea what you can do. If you prefer to do it digitally, you can do it in PowerPoint, you can do it in like Canva. So you can make a digital collage however you want to do it. It's important to identify what's important, why it's important, and exactly what it will look like. Not just my relationship with my daughter. Well, you know, how will I know when I've achieved that good relationship? Remember when we've talked about goals before, my favorite phrase is as evidenced by so a good relationship with my daughter, as evidenced a good relationship with my son, as evidenced by. That way I know what I'm working towards. So once you go through and I'll identify all of the things that are important and what it looks like, then you need to identify what you need to do to achieve each of those goals and add it to each slide. Or if you're doing it on poster board, you know, create another sheet that is your goals, your, your step by step goals for attaining whatever that thing is. And you know, you'll have multiple steps to that goal. You're not going to achieve everything overnight. This is a long term plan. But it helps you figure out, okay, what's the first step I need to take? That way every day you can look through your rich and meaningful life, look through the things that are important and identify different things that you can do. You're probably going to attend to each one on every single day, but it gives you some direction. The next thing that I recommend people do is identify what you can. Okay, hold your, hold your horses here. What you can stop doing that is draining your energy, which could be used to work towards those things that are important in your rich and meaningful life. So go through all of your pacer dimensions. Physically, are there things that are, you're doing that are draining your energy? For me, and it's hard for me to admit, but as I've gotten older, I can't work out as intensely and for as long as I used to without it completely sapping my energy. I've had to back off a little bit. Otherwise, by the time I finish my, my workout, I have a great workout. I feel great for about 30 minutes, and then I just really start to peter out and I have hard, a hard time getting focused for the rest of the day. I know that is one of those things that I can back off from. For example, to free up some energy affectively, you know, what things can you do to free up energy? Do you hold on to resentments? Do you nurture aggression? Do you nurture anger at things? Do you subject yourself to things that you know are going to trigger your anger and just, you know, burn through your energy? Skyrocket that cortisol, skyrocket that glutamate and norepinephrine when you are, when you don't have to, you know, you're going to have times when you need to have that fight or flight response, but when you're triggering it for no reason, when you're triggering it when you don't have to, that is just wasting a bunch of energy. It's like sitting in the, the, the driveway with the car in park and just revving that engine for 20, 30 minutes. Is that doing any good? No, it's just burning up your gas. So affectively, that may be something. Cognitively, what things do you do that may be draining your energy? For example, working in an environment where you're trying to think of multiple things at the same time, you're trying to multitask and you're trying to multitask on things. Weren't that essential, that may be one of them. Or trying to do things that maybe are not your strength, instead of synergizing, you are trying to do everything yourself. Our cognitions, our perceptions of things and the way we go about thinking about things can either be the easy way or the hard way. Environmentally, are there things that are draining Your energy that, or. And. Or your time that you could, you know, stop doing. For example, making sure you put your keys back in the same place every day. That's one of my biggies. I lose a lot of time and I get frustrated when I can't find my keys, so I'm losing a lot of energy. So environmentally, what can you do? Does it help to have some organization? Does it help to have essential oils that help you feel energized and focused? Does it help to have certain types of music that help you feel energized but don't drain your energy? And relationally, are there relationships that you could approach differently in order to free up some energy? Are there relationships that maybe you're devoting too much time to right now and in. And because of that, you're neglecting other things that are important in your rich and meaningful life? Part of purposeful action is using our energy in a balanced fashion. So once you figure out anything that you can stop doing in order to free up some of that excess energy, then you've got that energy out there. What can you. How can you use it? What can you do on a daily basis to use your energy to help you nurture or work towards the things that are important in your rich and meaningful life? You know, as you saw in the presentation that. That I did, good health and mental health and financial security underlie most of my goals. So I need to start planning for how can I make sure I have those? What can I do to ensure that I'm physically healthy? What can I do to take steps to ensure that I am mentally healthy? You know, to prevent dementia, to address depression, anything like that. And what can I do to make sure that I have financial security? That doesn't mean, you know, being fabulously wealthy. That means knowing that I have enough resources to keep food on the table, to, you know, keep a roof over my head. So when I retire, you know, ideally, I don't want to work until I'm 85. So at what point will I be able to step out and have some more time, some more free time? And what things can I do to start freeing up some time right now so I can engage in more of those things? So a lot of the core issues that people need to focus on are the same for a lot of their goals. If they are struggling with anxiety or depression or resentment or addiction or chronic pain, you know, addressing those things is going to be one of the first steps that they need to take in order to start working towards their rich and Meaningful life. So figuring out exactly what you need to do is is important. Mindfulness Once you figure out what your rich and meaningful life looks like Recognizing Remember in the happiness habits we talked about gratitude, Reflecting on the things that you currently have with purposeful action and cognitive flexibility. Psychological flexibility each morning you start out the day by reflecting on the things that are important in your rich and meaningful life and what you currently have. Too often we get up in the morning and we start focusing on the future. What we don't have, what we're worried about, what we're depressed about, that stuff's going to be there. But it's important to remember the other thing we've talked about living in the and recognizing that you can have a rich and meaningful life and experience some distress. So each morning reflecting on the things that are important to you in your rich and meaningful life, which parts of those you already have at least a little bit and what you're going to do that day to continue to use your energy to move towards those goals. Each time you're getting ready to do something that uses your energy throughout the day, ask yourself is this helping me get closer to my goals or is this using energy kind of throwing energy away and you're the only one that can make that decision. For example, if you know that the news is going to stress you out, is it worth is that a good use of your energy to turn keep the news on all day long? Maybe you want feel you need to have it on for 30 minutes a day to be an informed citizen. Okay, cool. But having it on 247 or 24 or 16 7. I guess we're awake for 16 hours a day. That can be information overload and it can be exhausting and very draining. So choosing you know, is doing this right now going to help me feel more energized and healthier and able to work towards the things that are important or is this going to drain SAP my energy? Every evening, reflect on how you used your energy positively during the day and experiences you can learn from. You notice I didn't don't say what you did wrong. What I'm saying is reflect on how you did used your energy positively to work towards that rich and meaningful life and you can say score, I did make some positive steps. And then the times that you didn't, you used your energy in a way that was counterproductive towards your rich and meaningful life. Okay, examine why you did that. Why did you choose away behaviors instead of towards behaviors and learn from that. Explore why that happened Were you not being mindful? Were you just kind of acting or reacting in the moment? Maybe whatever it was was more rewarding or very rewarding and you chose to do that instead. You chose to go for the short term benefits instead of the long term benefits. There's a lot of reasons, but it's important to learn from that because if you don't address it, you're going to keep doing the same thing and getting the same thing. You can think about your energy and your time each day like money in a bank account. You start out each day with a certain amount of money and everything you do costs and you've got to shell it out. And you want to spend as much of your money, as much of your resources as you can working towards those things that are important. As you go through life asking yourself, is what I'm doing right now, whether it is stressing over something, helping me move toward my goals of a rich and meaningful life. And you know, part of health is also mental health. So if happiness is important in your rich and meaningful life, then setting that as a goal and figuring out what is the first thing I can do, what can I start doing right now to improve the next moment? How will I know when? What will happiness look like for me and what is the first step I can start taking right now to move toward happiness and a rich and meaningful life? Are there questions about psychological flexibility? Psychological flexibility is a tool that you can use that starts out with mindfulness. You know, being aware of how you're feeling, what you're doing in the moment, or what you want to do in the moment, and then asking yourself, is this helping me move toward my goals or is this moving me away from my goals or taking energy that I could be using to go towards them, taking energy away from my goals. And Kim Whitefeather I will. When we get to the next. Let's see. Cognitive area, we can talk about irrational thinking, the six week series. Remember, we do cognitive on Wednesdays. So next Wednesday I can see how I might be able to work that into the six weeks to a happier, healthier you. Because cognitive distortions are certainly factors in maintaining unhappiness if you're interested in relapse prevention in the meantime, and also negative thinking. I do have multiple videos already on the YouTube channel that you can check out. Let me see. Hopefully I won't lose you guys. Let's see your channel. Here we go. Copy link address. Here you go. Here is one of the more popular, popular ones on negative thinking styles. And then. Whoops let's just do that. And then here is a list of different videos I did on relapse prevention. And when you're struggling with anxiety and depression, it is important to remember to break things down into manageable chunks. Identifying what is the next small step. Maybe that means just opening the blinds and sitting in front of an a bright window for a few minutes. Maybe that means, you know, getting up and just maybe yesterday you didn't have the energy to shower. Okay, well let's see. Maybe you can do that today. Maybe that can be. Your goal for the day, is to take one small step. Every small step you take builds on itself. So if you take one small step every day, by the end of the year you will have taken 364 small steps towards being happier and healthier. It's also important to address the things that are prompting the anxiety and depression. Remember, anxiety and anger are both part of the fight or flight response and they are normal emotions that happen in response to a perceived threat. So if you are feeling angry or anxious, that's your body telling you there might be a threat. You need to check it out. So that's important. And then you need to identify what those threats are, if they are currently threats, and how to cope with them. Depression is a state of feeling hopeless and helpless, a state of feeling powerless and unsafe a lot of times. So it's important to address what is it that I am feeling hopeless and helpless about. Remember depression as well as anxiety and, and anger. But depression especially has a lot of physiological causes. There are a lot of things like hypothyroid hormone imbalances, poor nutrition, poor sleep, sleep apnea, chronic pain, chronic inflammation, the list goes on. There are a lot of things that, physiological things that can cause depression. So it's important to see your doctor to rule out any physiological causes of depression. It's also important to remember that depression can cause some of those things. So if there are cognitions, if there are thoughts that are causing your depression, or experiences from trauma or grief that are contributing to your depression, your anxiety, your anger, it's going to be important to address those with a therapist, with a spiritual leader, whomever you feel is most equipped to help you with those things. But all of those things are steps you can take toward your rich and meaningful life. Which you know, like I said, for most people does include feeling happy and energetic. All righty everybody. Thank you for being with me today. I appreciate it. I will be here tomorrow at 9:30. I know it's Christmas Eve, but I, I really do want to go ahead and make sure that you guys get these episodes in in the six week time frame. That way you can start identifying tools. Get a new tool every single day to help you start living a happier, healthier life in 2021. It.