How to Get Anxious Thoughts Out of Your Head

Hey, babes. Hopefully this is working. I am doing a live video from my office here in Michigan. I am the only one here. The office is shut down. And so I came in because supposedly the wi fi is better. And I just tried doing a live a couple minutes ago and I don't think it worked. And so I here to do it again to say hey to you guys. This is a totally spontaneous live. It wasn't scheduled. I was just thinking about you and I had a couple of minutes. So in the previous video, I was talking about how parts work is all about. There's a part of you and a part of you may be happy, A part of you may be sad. A part of you may be angry. And so one of the key strategies with parts work is to identify those parts so that we can work with them and heal them. So one of the ways I like to identify the parts and work with them is to actually externalize them from the body and get them out of your head. Have you ever felt like your brain is full of all this information? It's swirling, confusing ideas, sometimes conflicting feelings and ideas, and it's just too much to keep track of. Well, this is an exercise that you can do to get all of that out of your head. I'm going to show you my super magical, fun way of doing it. And then at the end, I'll tell you ways that you could do it at home if you don't have a bunch of toys, which I'm about to show you. So I'm really pumped that you're here. I'm glad that you're able to be a part of my spontaneous live. Jennifer, my love, I'm so happy that you're here. Honey. I've been thinking about you. Becca, it's so good to see your little picture popping up in the corner. I miss connecting with you. And so let's jump in. Okay, so we're going to talk about how to get all of those chaotic feelings, feelings, thoughts and parts out of our bodies and externalize them. So my favorite way to do that is using the sand tray. And I have a sand tray here, and I have a couple of figurines on it already. And so this sand tray was made by my friend Kayla. And it's just simply a tray filled with sand. You can do it with rice or if you're like, who did it with noodles? You know, whatever you want. I can't remember what movie that was, but we're using sand. And so first thing is you need a sand tray and the second thing is you need toys. And so it's an excuse for me to buy some super cool, fun toys when I see them. And again, I'm telling you, if you don't have a sand tray and a bunch of toys at home, like, who doesn't? Then I'll teach you a way to do it with everyday home goods to get this chaos out of our heads and start to work with it. The strategy called parts work. So I will tell you an example of how I use it with these figurines and these toys with one of my clients. And so we're gonna call her Sue. And sue was having a lot of emotional angst and stress and anxiety about her mom. Her mom and her had a tumultuous relationship for many years, and she was 20 something years old when she decided to leave home and pursue a life of independence. And so, oh, Elizabeth, I'm glad you're here. And Courtney. And I'm glad the connection isn't wonky. This is good. So I was telling you about my patient who we're gonna call her sue, who is having a lot of guilt. And so when she was talking about the guilt, like, this part would come up and she'd start to notice it. We're calling it the guilty part is she would start to feel this overwhelming feeling of guiltiness and grief. But then that was immediately crushed by this overwhelming feeling, physical symptom where her throat felt like it was constricting, and then there's this weight on her chest. So we have two different things happening here, and it felt very overwhelming for her. And they felt like they were kind of overlapping on each other, and it was hard to talk about these different parts. So we externalized them, and that's what I'm teaching you today. So she. We looked through the tray, and every good sand tray should have a snake and maybe a bridge, a fish fence, all sorts of different things. I have a butterfly in here. And so she's looking through the sand tray, and when she picks out the representation of the guilty part, she actually picked out the frog. And when we're looking at parts, sometimes what you actually select can be really profoundly helpful. And then we set it on the tray, and then we just simply examine it, and we say, okay, what does this frog. What does this frog want us to know? What are its unmet needs? How old was I when this frog came out? What is this frog attempting to do? You pull that feeling, that thought, that part out of your head, and you put it in some sort of a Visual representation, and then you just simply explore it. So we have this frog. And then, as you remember, there's another part that came up too, and it was that part that was like crushing her. Her throat, her chest, and it was overwhelming her. And so she went into the sand tray, and she picked out this bear. The bear felt like it was aggressive and roaring and pushing down and counteracting those feelings of guilt. And she put it in a tray. And then when she placed them, she placed them facing each other, like they're heading off on each other, which made a lot of sense, given her experience. Right. And so now we're starting to play out the story that's going on in her head, and she's putting it in the tray, and she's able to externalize it and examine it, look at it. And one of the gifts of parts work is that sometimes the bear part, or whatever that is for you, will come up and stop the frog part from expressing. So she was trying to express and deal with these feelings of guilt, and this other part stopped the process. And so a lot of counselors and therapists will just talk to the bear. They don't pay any attention to the frog. And then people continue on feeling symptomatic, and they don't get well. And so this advanced technique allows us to identify there's a frog there and there's a bear, and very likely lots of other parts. So we could start to engage in this exercise with ourselves and start to externalize the thoughts and feelings we're having and visually display them. So not all of you have sand trays at home, and not all of you have buckets of toys. So let me tell you a fun way that you can do this pretty easily. And one is just simply getting a piece of paper and. And some colored pencils, markers, pens, or just a pencil, whatever you have. And then when you have a feeling coming up, whether it's the frog or the bear or anything else, and write the word or draw the feeling, sometimes just simply scribbling out on a piece of paper the way that that feeling is, and then just looking at it is enough. It can be so profoundly helpful and insightful. And then you start to think of the other part, and then you add it. And so this is another technique that you can use on your own at home when you're having parts and feelings come up, and then start to get to know them and work with them. And I will be here with you, and I'll be expanding on this topic every time I'm inspired to do a live. We talk a lot about this in the ACT method. It's a course that I have on anxiety. We really dive into this process and I want to help you with it and I want to be there for you. And so I hope that this was helpful. We were talking about parts work. I did not schedule this live or plan. It was literally sitting in my office thinking about you guys and I was like, oh, this is something I just did with a client recently and I wanted you to know about it. I will be back on Wednesday and I'll be around on Friday too. I'm trying to commit to two lives a week and they're Wednesdays and Fridays, 9:00am Arizona, 12:00 clock Eastern. And so I'm really glad that you guys were here. And Robert, you were here. I'm so glad that you got to connect on time. Courtney. You guys, Courtney in here. She's an amazing healer. And so if any of you guys are in Arizona and you're looking for a brilliant counselor, Courtney is my girl. And Jared, I love you. Thanks for being here. My very first person on today with this spontaneous, magical session, learning all about parts work. All right, my loves, I will be back Wednesday. You never know, I might be back before then too. But I'm very grateful for you all and thank you for the honor of being in this group post often ask questions. Let me know how I can best support you. All right, we'll talk with you soon. Bye.