Spiritual Interventions for Depression and Anxiety Relief

This episode was pre recorded as part of a live continuing education webinar on demand. CEUs are still available for this presentation through all CEUs register@allceus.com counselortoolbox you I'd like to welcome everybody to today's presentation. We're continuing our series that's based on my upcoming book, 100 Plus Practical Tips to Defeat Depression. And today we're talking about spiritual interventions. You remember last week I said that some people want to start with emotional interventions and start adding in the happy. Some people want to start with cognitive and start changing their thinking patterns. Some people are more comfortable with the physical stuff, getting their body where it's feeling more energetic. And then some people want to start with spiritual. So that's fine. You know, wherever they start is a good place in my mind to start because they're starting. Please remember, if you have any questions, anything you want to add, any tips you have, please put that in the chat window because I love to hear from y'. All. So we're going to define spirituality and discuss how recovery can be a spiritual journey. Will explore individual and group activities to help teach concepts of spirituality, including purposeful action, living in the present, values connectedness, honesty and authenticity, responsibility and discipline, and gratitude. So that, you know, that's really what we're talking about with spirituality. Not so much religion per se, recovery from depression, or just about anything can be a spiritual journey. It involves getting honest with yourself and others about what you can and can not change, realizing what your influence is and how you're connected. There are some things you can do and you can influence great change. And there are other things you can do and it's going to do nothing you can put a ton of effort into helps you develop compassion for yourself and others. Living mindfully and devoting energy to those things that are important to you in order to have what you define as a rich and meaningful life. Which is different probably for every single person that's in this room today. So, you know, it's important for us to be able to, you know, not only recognize our connection, but also have compassion and realize that not everybody's walking the same path. You know, you may have a co worker and you live in the same neighborhood, so it seems like you're kind of doing the same stuff, but that person may be struggling and you're not for whatever reason. So we do want to have compassion for one another as well as recognize our connectedness. It's a journey that requires you to identify where you want to go. You know, what does a rich and meaningful life look like to you instead of aimlessly wandering through life? And I usually make the analogy of going on vacation. You know, y' all know I'm structured. So when I go on vacation, I'm not as bad as my father in law who will like schedule in stop by stop and he schedules in the bathroom breaks and I'm like, oh, you know, we're gonna pee whenever I gotta pee. But, you know, it's, it's important to know where you're going. If you left on a vacation and you said, I've got two weeks off, I'm going on vacation. And somebody said, where you're go, where are you going? And you said, I don't know, I was just gonna get in the car and drive. Okay. You know, it doesn't necessarily get you to any particular place that's going to make you happy that you're going to look back and go, oh, that was a great vacation. It was a rich and meaningful vacation. To take some of our terms forward, but you have a plan. It may not be down to the last minute, but you know, if, you know, for me, for example, if I was going to go back to Florida, I'm leaving Nashville, Tennessee, and I'm generally going to get on ex and so road and I'm going to drive down and I'll probably stop in Chattanooga for lunch and I'll probably stop in Georgia for the night and then I'll continue on to Florida. I have ideas along the way, so I'm not getting sidetracked and taking this other route somewhere that takes me where I don't want to go, and it just wastes a bunch of gas. So authenticity and honesty, this is one of the hardest things for a lot of clients because they have been chameleons most of their life. They have been trying to do what people want them to do and be who people want them to be without trying to figure out what is it that I want. So they need to get honest with themselves. A lot of times, clients are relatively honest with other people, but it's hard to be honest with other people about what you need when you don't even know what you need. So it involves getting honest with yourself and then starting to be honest with others and living authentically, living in a way that is relatively in harmony with, with your needs and your wants. So one thing you can do, and you can either do the Jenga activity where you write stuff on blocks, you're going to end up with a bunch of Jenga games. If you use Jenga for everything, you can do a hat draw and you write each one of these questions on an index card and you put them in a hat and you know, pretty self explanatory. You pass the hat around and people draw something out. Or you can do the thing with the beach ball where you write these questions on a beach ball and you can paraphrase them for the beach ball. So you can say favorite food, favorite movie. You don't have to put the what is your. Because that would take up a lot of space on the beach ball. But these are different ways that you can operationalize these questions for group. Instead of just sitting there and talking and okay, what's your favorite food? You know, let's talk about that. And it may seem like that's not something that you would want to cover in group, but in reality it's encouraging for people to be forced to stop and think about the simple things. The simple things like what's your favorite food? Not, you know, what do you want for dinner tonight? What's your favorite food? Whatever you want. No, that's not it. What is your absolute favorite food? And then people in the group will start to talk and go, oh my gosh, that's mine too. Or have you ever had or have you ever eaten at this restaurant? So they start talking and developing some support for one another, developing some camaraderie. This is a great group to do at the beginning of a group series to help people start to get to know each other. Because there's generally in these questions nothing that's too poignant, traumatic, earth shattering, you know, anything anybody's going to be self conscious about and you want to ask them what it is and why is it your favorite? So for example, you know, lasagna is one of my favorite foods, you know, so I would talk about the fact that what it is and why it's my favorite. And part of that's just because I love tomato paste and mozzarella cheese. I don't really have a sentimental reason for it. I just, it's good. And you can do that for a lot of different, you know, movie, color, book, play songs, yada, yada. And this helps people start to get in touch. What's the most important characteristic in a friend? And you know, everybody's allowed their own opinion about what the most important thing is. But if somebody gets the ball, they get this question and they say honesty. And then other people may go, yeah, you know, it's honesty for me too. Well, so none of Those people get the ball next and throw the ball again and see or ask somebody else. What's another important characteristic? There's no real rules to how you use the beach ball. You can use it to start conversation, or you can just keep it going and keep switching topics. Other questions what makes you a good person? What's one thing you really need right now to feel your best? You know, that could be a good night's sleep, it could be a hug. Who knows? What's one thing you're proud of? What's one thing you'd like to improve? What's one goal you're striving toward? And what's one thing that's holding you back from achieving your goals? So we're not asking for everything. We're asking for people to start identifying some of their goals and some of their obstacles and then they can start thinking about those. This isn't an in depth therapy group, but it's encouraging them to start getting honest and thinking about what they can do to live authentically now that they've identified these things. Another thing that you can do is the miracle question. If I woke up tomorrow and I was happy, what people, places and things? Not PowerPoints. What people, places and things would be the same? And what people, places and things would be different? A lot of times we say, if I woke up tomorrow and was happy, what would be different? Well, that's only half of it because some things are going to be the same. And when we identify what's the same, it helps people realize that there are some things that are going right. You know, I wouldn't want my children to change for anything in the world. So if I woke up tomorrow and everything was perfect, my children would still be the same. You know, there are other things that I might change. So encourage people to write a list or a description of what they want and need and remind them that they don't have to share it with anybody. So put it all out there. Even if it sounds boastful or greedy or envious or whatever attributions they put with it, that's okay, they don't have to share it with anybody. But let's get it out there so you can start figuring it out, figuring out where you're going. By getting it out. People have the ability to look at it and decide which things are really what they want and worth making and which things are just a knee jerk reaction to stress or despair. So if somebody says, if I woke up tomorrow and I was truly happy, I would be in a Different job at a CEO of XYZ Corporation. And, you know, they go back and look at it later and they realize that, you know, there are drawbacks to that too. And I'm just unhappy in my current position, don't really want to change jobs. So then they can start thinking about what they need to do to make the best of their current situation improve the next moment. Same thing with relationships. You know, if I woke up tomorrow and everything was perfect, you know, I would have the knight that rides in on the white horse or, you know, Prince Charming or whomever it is that we idealize. And when you stop back and think, you know, is this really what I want? A lot of times people are going to realize that no, you know, that's just kind of a knee jerk reaction. I want things to change or to be different, but I don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater, so to speak. Sometimes when we're living authentically, though, we do things for people that we don't really want to do. That doesn't mean we're behaving inauthentically necessarily. Sometimes we do it because those people are important to you. You know, when my son wants to go shooting or go to the archery range, I don't really like doing that, but I do it because that's important to him and he's important to me. So, you know, once removed, it's important to me. When my daughter wants to go to the mall, you know, I'm not a mall person, but I will take her to the mall. So those are things that we do that, you know, aren't necessarily what would make us the happiest in the whole world, but making somebody else happy, you know, that has a benefit to it. So in those cases, putting your needs aside for the moment serves to enhance something more important to you than just what you're doing right now. Because I'm enhancing that relationship with my child or my spouse or whatever, the challenge becomes balancing people's needs with other people. So, you know, if your client is always putting other people's needs first and always deferring to them because it makes them happy, you know, we really want to look at. Is that making them as happy as they could be? Sometimes it does. You know, some people just, they thrive on giving. And, you know, who am I to say that that's not okay? The question is, do they feel like they're getting their needs met or are they feeling abandoned, left out, depressed, helpless, any of that stuff? And if they are, then we need to look at setting some boundaries and getting some balance and making sure that they feel comfortable, occasionally saying, let's put my needs first here. Because, yeah, we don't want them to become codependent, and we don't want to feed into codependency. We want to make sure that what they're doing is healthy for them as well as for whomever they're doing it for. So we move past honesty and authenticity into values identification. So people have started figuring out on the surface what they like, what they need, that kind of stuff. Let's go a little deeper into our values. And values are some of those tricky things. You're like, well, what does that mean? And some people will call them virtues, Some people call them values. What I generally say to clients is, if you woke up or if you passed away, what are five things that you would want people to remember you for that would be on your epitaph? And obviously, I'm careful about what types of groups I say that in. But virtues or values can be acceptance, accountability, assertiveness, beauty, benevolence, bravery, caring, charity, yada, yada, yada. There's hundreds of them, and I give them a list because most people have difficulty coming up with things. And I have them identify what values are important to them. Another activity is to take these values. Honesty, honest, loyal, compassionate, hard worker, humorous, knowledgeable, popular, powerful, respectful, optimistic, and tidy. You know, that's like 10 or 11. And put them on posters around the room. You see where we're going with this? And then ask each person to stand under the value that's most important for them to be known for. And then discuss why people chose that one. Why is, you know, why does somebody choose being a hard worker more important than being honest? And these are ones that are really hard just to differentiate. You know, you might have three of them that are tied for first place, but you're forcing people to try to think and choose and encourage them to think about who taught them that that particular value or virtue was important. And do they believe that that's the most important thing. Ask if anyone has done anything in the past month that went against that value, and if so, how it made him or her feel. Because a lot of times it's really important to recognize that when we do things that are not in sync or are authentic with our values, that it makes us feel uncomfortable or unhappy. And we talk about head, heart, and gut honesty. In my groups, if we're doing things that are authentic, they will logically be right. They will feel right in our heart, and they won't make our stomach get all tied up in knots. So if your head, heart and gut say it's okay, then you're probably good to go. If one of those is out of whack, you may need to pay attention. And Amy suggests another thing you can do is give people a list of values and have them rank order them from, you know, 1 to 10. So there's a lot of different ways you can do this particular activity. You can discuss how values shape how people view the world, what's important to them, and how they define goodness. Because, believe it or not, there are multiple different ways to define goodness, and people will start talking about that. You can't live authentically and purposefully without knowing what you value. So starting to get in touch with that will help you start behaving more authentically and help you more clearly identify what it takes to have a rich and meaningful life. So all of these things, all of these values can either contribute to a stronger sense of peace and self worth if you're living in concert with them, or a greater sense of confusion, helplessness, hopelessness, and depression. If most of what you're doing is contrary to your values and what's important to you, you're probably feeling, you know, stuck or unhappy or, you know, other dysphoric type feelings. People are encouraged to value, to evaluate what their values are, where they came from, whether they truly believe them. Because sometimes we're taught things when we're growing up and we look back later and we go, yeah, you know, I don't think that's right. What people's values, how people's values impact their actions and their resulting impact on the person, society, you know, macro system and the reciprocal interaction and how people choose to nurture their values, which ones they nurture and which ones they let go when there's a conflict. So if you have a conflict between being honest and being a loyal employee, you know, if your supervisor is asking you to do something as dishonest, you know, which one of those is more important? Which of those do you hold on to? So those are all scenarios that you can, that you can provide. And Kelly suggests you can also have clients make posters. So they can make posters together about different values and maybe why they're important. So now that we know what we need, what we want, what we value, we move on to purposeful action. Everything we do has a purpose. You know, if I take the dog out, it has a purpose. I don't want him to crap on the floor. But Purposeful action is more specific than that. It refers to doing things that help us move towards our rich and meaningful life. Instead of just willy nilly doing whatever comes our way, we stop and think and say, will doing this help me get closer to the people, things and places that are important in my life? So you need to remember or think about or clients need to think about who or what is important to them. And I have several different areas. Their health, their family, their education, music, friends, religion, sports, hobbies, their job, money, pets, and any other category they want to put in there. And some people will identify. Something like music is not important to my husband at all. He's just not musically inclined, doesn't really like to listen to the radio. So that's, you know, he crossed that one off. He's like, nah, don't care about that. So it's important for people to evaluate each one of these categories and figure out which of them are important and in what way are they important. Like for a job, do you need to have a job that makes six figures and gives you lots of power, or do you just need to have something that pays the bills and keeps a roof over your head? Those are two very different things. So figuring that out helps people define what a rich and meaningful life looks like to them. They've already defined what values are important, so that goes into that rich and meaningful life. And then they can start looking retrospectively about how their actions reflect those things. So we're going to start creating some dissonance, helping them see that, you know, some things they've been doing, maybe codependent behaviors or being passive instead of assertive, whatever it is that they're doing, choices that they're making are not helping them move towards what's important in their life. Maybe they're spending way too much time at work. They look at their rich and meaningful life and they see how much of that is comprised of their family and their hobbies and stuff. And they're like, wow, I haven't seen my family in three or four days because I've been at work. Well, they can start looking at that and figuring out what they may need to do to start swinging the pendulum in the other way and dividing their energies and attentions. And then we can talk about, you know, why is it you've worked for four days straight? My boss used to sleep at the office. We would, and especially during grant season, he would have been up working on a grant there until two in the morning, taking a three hour cat nap. And then he would still be there. And he would do that for two or three days concurrently. And, you know, that's just not something that I was willing to do because I had children at home, and that was not a boundary I was willing to cross. So if people are, you know, spending a whole lot of energy in one area and neglecting other areas and it doesn't feel so good, we want to talk about what's motivating them to overemphasize this area. What are they afraid of if they set boundaries or what do they think will happen? So encourage clients to start looking at that dissonance. You can have them write three columns on a piece of paper, Emotional, cognitive, and physical. And just evaluate for today, what did they spend their energy on? If they got up this morning and they stepped in a hairball and went downstairs and the coffee maker was broken and they got angry, and then they got on Facebook and something else made them angry, that's a lot of emotional energy before 8 in the morning. So we want to think about what did you spend your emotional energy on? And you can have the total opposite. You can get up, it's a bright, sunny day, you see your family, you know, you're spending emotional energy, but it's happy energy. Cognitively, what have you been focusing your attention on? What have you been thinking about all day long? And physically, what have you spent your energy on? Some of it's going to be good, you know, going to the gym, you know, driving to work, making kids lunches, whatever it is. But we do want to start encouraging people to think about how they're spending their energy and if they're frittering it away doing things that don't really matter. So I usually have clients do this activity on a break. You know, 10 minutes, you know, I just want you to fill this out. And then we come back together. I put three columns on the whiteboard, then we start sharing. So people can see again that there are a lot of commonalities in what they do on a daily basis. Once we get that list up there, I ask them, you know, how many things that you spent your energy on today really matter in the long run. You know, a year from now, will this really matter? If you got up and you made breakfast for your family and that is important to you, then a year from now, you know, that may really matter because it enhanced that relationship. If you got up and you stepped on a hairball, it's unpleasant. But two hours from now, that's probably not going to be a matter. It's going to be a distant memory. So do you really want to spend all morning scolding the cat every time you see him? What's the worst thing that will happen? That's another thing that we can look at. And when they look at how they spent their energy, what's the worst thing that will happen? If I choose choose not to invest any more energy in this, is this something that's worth all of the energy I'm putting into it? And what else could I use this energy to do that would help me be happier and healthier? So if you notice that, you know, the person notices that they're spending 12 hours a day at work, you know, six days a week, that's a lot. And if they don't need that, you know, they don't need that income for some reason, encouraging them to look at, okay, if you worked, let's say, 10 hours every day, what could you do with those other two hours that would help you be happier and healthier? Reminding people that, you know, sometimes they need to sharpen the saw. They need to take some time to rest and relax so they can be on their A game. Encouraging clients to ask themselves is, whatever it is that I'm spending my energy on, something I even have control of, you know, if not, it's not worth putting the energy into it, because no matter how much you try to change it, you're just fighting a losing battle. So another activity you can suggest that people try is what I call my purpose for today. Have your clients start each day envisioning their goals and what a rich and meaningful life is to them. So they envision this rich and meaningful life and then commit themselves each day to prioritize doing things that will move them toward that goal. So this is kind of starting to get into that mindfulness realm where they're checking in with themselves. They're going, okay, where do I want to go from here? It's like when you're. You get up and you're on a. On a vacation. I have a friend of mine who's hiking the Appalachian trail right now, and I'm sure when she gets up in the morning, she makes her breakfast, and she thinks, okay, I'm gonna make it to, you know, eight miles today, or I'm gonna do this, that, or the other. And that is her planning how she's gonna spend her energy and committing herself to doing that instead of, you know, going swimming or whatever else. So the river rock exercise can be fun or it can be confusing. So, you know, just thinking about that, create A mini pond. And I usually use like a punch bowl. Add water first. I do that. And then put a little gravel in the bottom, like fish tank gravel, and then sand on top, which is a little heavier, and then dirt on top of that. And then you need to give some time for everything to settle to the bottom because that's going to be somewhat like. Somewhat like a river or a stream. You're going to have some lighter sediment, heavier sediment, and then rocks. So when the clients come in, we talk about our impact on things and how the world impacts us and we impact the world. And I'll take a decent sized rock, you know, one that's about the size of my hand, and I'll plop it in. And we discuss what happens when you throw a stone into the pond. You know, initially people say it makes ripples, you know, or. Because they're thinking about that, or they've seen it in the, in the activity that you just did. And that's true. And we talk about what those ripples are. If, if we think about the rock being what we're doing, you know, we're taking an action, we're doing something. How is it affecting the water? You know, it affects everything in our system and it radiates out, but it also, you know what else? It scares the fish and disturbs the sediment so it goes deeper. A lot of times all we talk about is the stuff that's on the top layer on the crust on the surface. But 80% of the iceberg is underneath the water. And, yeah, I start mixing metaphors a lot and they just kind of roll their eyes. But 80% of what gets disturbed when you throw a rock in is actually stuff you can't see. You have that sediment that gets disturbed, the fish get scared and they swim away. So they're not there for people who are fishing, you know, a lot of different things and people will throw out different ideas. Then you draw a diagram of the ripples and disturbances on the whiteboard, and it doesn't have to be artistic. And ask how actions act like that rock. If you're the lake, you know, you're this big body of water, so their surface impacts and it impacts around you, but it also impacts things within you and, you know, underneath. So. And whoops, where's my. There we go. Ask them how purposeful action would impact them. You know, when you do things that you. And you're doing intentionally, they're still going to affect. Affect you. They're going to use your energy, whatever. So, like when you throw A rock into the river or when you get into a bathtub, that's a little bit more visualizable. You know, not only do you disturb the water, but the water level also rises. You know, if you get into a tub that's half full, it may rise considerably. So how would those changes impact the people around you? Or in the case of the river, the fish, the spiders on the water, the sediment? And, you know, this goes easier if you're working with people who are familiar with, you know, ponds and stuff. I don't know that it would have the same impact in New York City that it does in Nashville. And how would those changes impact you? So, you know, I'm thinking if I throw this rock in and I scare away all the fish, well, I'm not going to be able to fish. And if I can't fish, then I can't eat. And if I can't eat, I'm going to be hungry. So some things I may not want to do, I may want to be more careful when I drop the rock in. Whatever people do when they choose their actions, if it makes them less stressed, happier, more energetic, gives them more time to spend with significant others, that's great. That's probably going to improve how they feel. Then their significant others often probably going to feel more relaxed and appreciated because the person is spending more time with them and isn't quite as grumpy. It's like, okay, the relationships getting better, this is cool. So they're happier, the client is happier. You know, the world starts getting happier. And the client, when the, when the. When your significant others are happier and you can see that you're part of that, the client may start feeling more supported and connected because they're able to connect with people and people want to connect with them. Instead of going, oh, she's in a grumpy mood, just leave her. You know, they're saying, wow, she's such. So vivacious and has such so much energy. And I want to be around her. My best friend from college was like that. She was just a ball of optimism. You couldn't be around her without having a good day. So living in the here and now and, you know, more moving towards that, that mindfulness, worry and regret are extremely draining emotions, and we've talked about those. And those emotions compound people's sense of hopelessness and helplessness, which compound their sense of stuckness and depression. Living in the past or in the future prevents people from being connected with the now. And they need to ask, what am I missing by worrying about what I did at work today or continuing to think about a mistake I made. An office party and teenagers, I've got two of them, often have these things and they will perseverate on things that didn't go well at school or didn't go well in martial arts. Instead of thinking about the present moment and realizing that people probably don't even really remember, but we're all egocentric to a certain point. Living in the here and now helps people appreciate what they have and focus on what they need to do to improve the next moment. Instead of going, you know, I'm worried that things will never get better. What can you do now to improve the next moment? How can you handle regrets? You know, a lot of our clients have a whole litany of them and that keeps them stuck back there because they keep thinking, I wish I wouldn't have, or if I would have only so how can we handle that? So people are thinking, I'm good, I'm in a good place. Ask clients how they can handle anxiety and worry and sometimes they may want to look, look at that and figure out ways they've handled it in the past that's been successful and healthy. Not all ways we handle things are necessarily healthy. They helped us survive until now with the tools that we had. But now it's time to develop healthier tools. So if their way of handling stress before was to smoke, you know, and maybe they're trying to quit smoking and get healthier, then great. How else could you handle anxiety and worry? And how can you start learning to focus on the here and now? And that's different for every person. Some people will tie a string around their finger, some people will put a note on their dashboard. I encourage people to do mindfulness check ins at every meal, you know, because that's sometimes a time where they can put anchors and remember it and, or spend, you know, 10 minutes each day doing it or identify places to do it. When I'm driving, I focus on being as mindful as possible. You know, looking at the groundhogs and the, and the, and the hawks and whatever else. I saw Scooby Doo in the clouds the other day when I was going home. I was so mad I couldn't like stop and get a picture of it. But I digress. So we want to think about how can you start learning about learning to focus on the here and now. And once you start doing it every meal and then every meal and when you're driving, then you just keep adding on to that. And before people Know it, they're living mindfully the majority of the time. And Carl suggests try to spend one minute of every waking hour practicing mindfulness. And you can get a Tabata timer or a countdown timer on your mobile device and you can have it go off every 59 minutes and remind you to take a break and be mindful for that one minute. That would drive me a little batty, but it works for some people. You know, Another activity is an egg hunt. Hide 20 or 30 plastic eggs around the office. Give clients 3 minutes to find as many as they can. They're going to be worried about time and other people finding the eggs before them, just like kids are when they do an Easter egg hunt. On Easter, when the three minutes is over, point out all the eggs that were missed because people were living in the future worried that they weren't going to get the most eggs. And help them draw draw parallels between worrying about getting the most eggs versus just being in the moment and really examining what was right in front of them. Another thing they can do is create a worry or regret. In addictions recovery, we call this a God box where they take their worries and their regrets and they figure out, you know, they come to some sort of an understanding of them and then they turn them over to their higher power and God. I have it all in caps because for those who are non religious, it can stand for good orderly direction. And good orderly direction is that path that we're taking to a rich and meaningful life. And if worrying about this is not helping me get toward that rich and meaningful life, then it's distracting me. It's taking me away from my good, orderly direction. You can also encourage them to spend 10 to 20 minutes each day writing a description or thinking about what is going on around them. Some people, I personally would hate this, but some people really enjoy doing that kind of thing. It isn't magic, is it? And this is one that kind of like doing. Just like magicians try to keep you focused on something else other than what's going on right in front of you so they can trick you. If you're focused on the past or on the future, you're also going to miss what's going on right in front of you. And I have a couple videos. I'm going to see if I can pull them up real quick. Just a second here. New Share share Computer sound. There for you.

Hi, I'm Doug. On behalf of expertvillage.com let's talk about patter. How magicians use patter as distributed patter. Is very important. It's what you say is what patter is, how you say it, what you're emphasizing in the coin trick or the French drop. You never want to forewarn the people what you are going to do, because then they're going to be looking for it. And it's very important. If I said, hey, look it, I'm going to make this coin disappear, it's gone. There's no element of surprise. And it's okay if you're really good at your sleight of hand. But then again, they've already seen it coming. Not so good. My pattern for this trick is, I like to say, okay, we're going to take an ordinary coin. What is it? So they're thinking, okay, what is it? It's a quarter or it's a large coin.

So he gets them distracted thinking about other things other than what's going on right in front of them. He gets them distracted from the trick.

What's the date on the coin? Is a good question to ask people. So they're thinking they're getting into the trick, they're being involved. You're involving them into the trick, and they're not thinking you're going to make it disappear. So the importance of patter is to, again, create a little bit more element of surprise in what you're saying. It's also part of patter is telling stories, let's say. Okay, well, we're going to take an ordinary orange, a small orange, actually. Who here likes orange juice? Because we're actually going to. Whoops. The trick has gone wrong.

And the other video. I won't. Well, I will pick show it to you real quick so you can see what it is, because we've got time.

I'm Mike Sinclair and welcome to the Scream Freak Rewind. In today's Magic Reveal tutorial, going to.

Teach you guys how to perform a.

Really neat levitation without the use of any expensive gimmicks, invisible threads, or even loops. You guys are literally going to be able to go out and buy the invisible threads and the loops ball like so. Now watch. Just like that.

You guys ready to learn how that was done? Okay, so he shows them a trick and then he goes back and says, so here's all the things that you missed that I actually did right in front of your eyes. And you know, some magicians, if they're really good at things, you wouldn't see it. But the point is, and you can also do it with the shell game, the point is to help people recognize that if they're distracted, they may not notice what's going on right in front of them. And this can be kind of fun, you know. Responsibility and discipline. Responsibility means becoming accountable for yourself and your own happiness without feeling excessively responsible for others. And this is really hard for people who identify as codependent, but it's also really hard for a lot of people who again, have been chameleons most of our life. So it's important to encourage people to look at responsibility instead of, it's my responsibility to make sure everyone's happy, that it's my responsibility to take care of myself and my own happiness and do right, live by my values. And other people are responsible for their own emotions. You know, it's responsible. I'm responsible for not hurting somebody else, but if I do something that makes them angry, you know, because they don't get their way, I'm not responsible for their feelings. It's, it's a very gray area and it's a very difficult skill for especially teenagers to kind of wrap their heads around. Feeling like you're responsible for how other people feel can be enormously draining, frustrating and depressing. Because some people, no matter what you do, they're not going to be happy with it. Some people, no matter what you do, they are just going to be deliriously happy. Like my best friend from college, I mean, she was just like, oh, well, you know, whatever. I learned something from it. I was just like, oh my gosh, you were just so positive. But people are responsible for choosing. Now we have this knee jerk reaction, if you want to put it that way. When something happens based on our prior learning that causes us to feel an emotion, that's normal. You know, we may initially feel this burst of anger or fear or something that's normal. We want to acknowledge it and say, okay, threat response system was set off. I got it. Let me check and see if there's a problem. It's up to us what we do with that emotion. We can hold on to it and we can nurture it and we can feed it and we can, you know, just get consumed by it, or we can choose to identify it for what it is. Like anger tells us that there's some sort of a threat that we may need to protect ourselves from, so we may need to do something about it. You know, you just have to take each thing as it comes and that goes with that psychological flexibility and reminding clients, and I encourage them to spend an entire week just reminding themselves that they are the only ones who can Control how they feel and what they do with those feelings. They're going to have that automatic reaction. But then after that reaction, it's up to them whether they hold on to it and stay angry for an entire day, or they're angry for 30 minutes and then just let it go. Joy suggests that a good teaching tool is the book boundaries. And that's exactly what we're talking about here, is boundaries that we want help people to develop emotional, cognitive, and physical boundaries so they feel okay in their own skin. Now gratitude, you know, they're making changes. They're living in the present. And gratitude is really helpful because sometimes when we're living in the present, it's a really gray, rainy, icky day. Gratitude is the recognition of the little miracles that occur every day when people are depressed. It's easier to focus on all of the things that are not going right and seeing the glass as half empty and seeing the day as, you know, raining all day and whatever. If you adopt an attitude of gratitude, it can help rebalance impressions of things. So encouraging people to try to have an attitude of gratitude every morning when they wake up, you know, being thankful that they woke up, being thankful that their family's safe, being thankful for. Try to identify three things that they're grateful or thankful for in the morning. They don't have to necessarily say them out loud, but they can, if they want, talk in group about how an attitude of gratitude creates a ripple effect. So if I get up in the morning and I identify three or five things that I'm grateful for, how does that affect the rest of my day? How does that affect how I interact with other people? How does that affect my work productivity versus if I get up and I'm just like, oh, this day is going to suck, I don't want to deal with anybody. You know, they're two different perspectives. Encourage clients that each time they experience something negative to force themselves to remember at least one thing that they're grateful for. And it doesn't have to be the yin and the yang. It doesn't have to be the silver lining of the current negative thing. You know, it can be raining miserably outside, and you can be grateful that you don't have to. Working a job where you're working outside in the rain all day long, you know, they're a little bit different, or, you know, it's raining and it's a yucky day, but, you know, hey, I've got all these other things going for me, so some activities that you can do if you have space in your facility. Create a gratitude garden or encourage clients to create a gratitude garden. And every single week, you know, I'd like to do it every single day, but it's not practical. Every single week, get a flower of some sort and plant it in their gratitude garden to remind them of something they're grateful for that week. So 52 weeks, you're going to have 52 plants or flowers and you can get them for really cheap. You don't have to get, you know, gallon sized plants. You can get the little, you know, dollar plants that you can get. Annuals, perennials are always great because then you just continue to build on your gratitude garden year after year. People can have a gratitude journal or box if that's what makes them happy. Another interesting one is having a gratitude mural or mosaic. And this can be broken glass like you would think of a normal mosaic. Or you can get tiles from Home Depot or from a home. They have those home recycling centers where they take stuff from houses that have been demolished and you have old doors and stuff. Sometimes you can find tiles that are intact. You can get cheap tiles at Home Depot or Lowe's or something like the little tiny square ones or rectangular ones. Those are fine too. And people can write things that they're grateful on those particular mosaic tiles and just add to that mosaic once a week. Or with the mosaic, you can even do it once a day if it's a family. If you'd make this a family activity, then you know that's something that you can work together. After dinner every night, for example, everybody adds a tile to the mosaic and talks about something they're grateful for for that day. Another really fun one is a family gratitude quilt. And obviously you're not going to do this every day. Once a month, maybe you get together and you talk about things that you're grateful for and you take pictures of them. And this isn't the best representation that I could find, but you can get them printed on fleece blankets and you combine them so you know, there's four people in the family. Every person shares something once a month. So that'll be 48 pictures on a fleece blanket. And then you can order it and have it printed out so everybody can look at it and remember the really awesome things from that particular from that particular year for the family. You can also do it if you have a long standing group, like an IOP group, and they want to have a memory blanket. You know, you can make that too. They're not inexpensive, but they're not super expensive to order either. I think they're like between 48 and $60, depending on how big it is. Connectedness encourages people to remember their connection with the earth, nature and everyday life. So they feel less isolated remembering that they play a significant role in the overall energy in their environment. And each person can contribute positive or negative energy. So around our place, I live on a farm anyway, so it's not hard to do. We have it certified as a wildlife habitat. We have a couple places where there are brush piles for different animals and things like that. But that gives positive energy. I had a mama rabbit have her babies in my front yard the other day. So I haven't been able to mow the. Well, it's been about a month now. I've been able to mow the front yard for a while. But you know, she makes me happy. I go out there and check on them every day and I put food out for her, you know, on the other side of the driveway so it doesn't attract predators. But that brings positive energy to my environment. So I'm trying to encourage her, bribe her to stay. Another thing you can do with clients is take them on a nature walk. Go for a walk for 30 minutes, writing down everything that they notice on a piece of paper. Sights, smells, sounds, temperatures, things they feel. Because we as Americans typically have a breakneck pace, we often don't notice the things right in front of us that are really awesome. We just notice the things that are causing us problems. There was the cutest little groundhog on my way to work today. He was standing up on his bed, hind legs, and they're just so cute. They're like oversized hamsters. And encourage people to think about how many of these pleasant things like the robins or the birds or the smells, would you have normally noticed if you hadn't have been forced to think about what was going on? Talk about how being aware of positive things in life, being more mindful and recognizing our connectedness and how we can bring positivity into our area can encourage us to or can help us reduce our depression. Talk about how when people are content, what's the ripple effect on the world around them? How does when they're connected and they're feeling content, how does, does it impact their mood, their relationships, their patients, their work product, their environment? If again, you're doing a long standing group, you can discuss how it impacts the group when someone drops out or is struggling. This is really true in substance abuse groups. It's very impactful. If somebody relapses or if they're struggling to all the members in the group. So that helps people realize that they're not just an island. They impact other people and other people impact them. You can do a you have influenced me card for each person in the group. They can write on it, you have influenced me by. And ideally, I have them, I specify a positive way. Every person in the group has influenced you. You can do that in your family. I did that with my family when I was a teenager. We wrote cards to one another talking about what each person in the family, how they had influenced you. So that was. That's cool and optimistic Oscar. You know, Oscar's usually a grouch, but optimistic Oscar. You have this guy named Oscar, and whenever you're around him, he just sees the best in everything. And you can maybe have somebody come into group that day and just be optimistic Oscar. And talk about how that affects everyone else and how it makes them feel to be around somebody that's just so positive and so, you know, enthusiastic. So spiritual interventions help people feel more connected. They help them get honest with themselves and others about what's important to them and about what they can and cannot change. They realize, you know, the connectedness. They start learning to develop compassion for themselves and others by seeing commonalities with one another and recognizing if you're living in the moment, you're seeing when someone is struggling, instead of being in your own head and going, oh, this person is holding me up. If you're compassionate and you're in the moment, you're gonna see this person is struggling and may go, hmm, I wonder how I can help them. Whole different perspective. Spiritual interventions help people live mindfully, devoting energy to those things that are important to them and recognize their connection and impact on everyone and everything around them. So it's not just the people. You know, I impact my environment. I have the same place that I sit on the sofa a lot, so I've got an imprint that's, you know, I impacted the sofa. My dog did the same thing. You know, we have impacts on things. You can tell, you know, when you walk into a room, when you walk into somebody's house, it smells like, you know, my grandmother's house smelled one way, my house smells another way. And it has an impact and it creates memories and things for everybody who comes into that environment. Jesse suggested taking a 10 minute walk with a small child and you will realize how much you don't notice. Oh, my gosh, that's so true. Our parkours in Lebanon has little signs every 200ft or something. And it encourages parents to stop and ask a particular question of their child if they're walking their child out there. Like, how many different shapes of leaves do you see? Or how many different things do you see right now that are green? I love that game. When I used to be little and we'd drive somewhere, you know, how many things do you see? I spy with my big brown eyes seven things that are red. So those can be kind of fun. But, yeah, I mean, kids notice things because they're living in the moment, Especially little kids. Before they start worrying about what other people think. They're just all over the place. I would take my son to the museum. Oh, my gosh, he would wear me out. It didn't matter what museum we were at. He was wide open, Running from exhibit to exhibit, noticing this and that and the other thing. And sometimes it's good to get back into that mode every once in a while and just notice. Okay, well, I appreciate you all being here today. Are there any questions? I really appreciate all yalls interjections today. Amy did share something. When we're back talking about magic and distraction and being focused, that a lot of times when people try to make changes, and it can be people with addictions or people with mood disorders and they start talking about doing something different and even start doing things differently, the family may actually try to distract them from it. You know, you don't need to go to those meetings right now and yada yada, yada, because the family's uncomfortable with having to change. Remember, you know, in addiction, we talk about it as a family illness because everything the person with the addiction does impacts the family and vice versa. Families like homeostasis, it may not be the ideal family, but they know what to expect. So then when things start to change, we typically try to resist change. And, you know, so it's important to try to take a look at whether our behaviors are trying to distract somebody or whether we are being distracted by someone. Alrighty, everybody. I will see you on Thursday. And we're going to talk about environmental interventions. And, you know, a little hint leading up to that, I had a colleague one time that told a client, you know, it seems like you're struggling because you haven't been bathing or cleaning up your room lately, and you're outside often reflects what's going on on the inside. And it made me think. So we talk a lot about, you know, one way to help improve our mood for some people is to start with improving the outside you know, how would you feel if you were in a room that was painted all white, had no colors, and was completely disorganized? All the. 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