#14 | You Can’t Be an Ally If You’re Burnt Out—Protect Your Energy First

The Savvy Ally is hands down the best guide for becoming a skilled LGBTQ+ advocate. I had the absolute pleasure of interviewing Jeanne Gainsbourg for episode 92. If you haven't heard it yet, listen to it now. You'll get a little preview of this book and then click through and buy it today. There's no better time. Than right now, Pride Month, to get this book.

Welcome to Just Breathe, the podcast focused on transforming the LGBTQ+ conversation and supporting you on your journey with your LGBTQ loved one. You are not alone. Welcome to Just Breathe: Parenting Your LGBTQ Teen. My name is Heather Hester, and I am excited to be with you to transform the conversation around loving and raising an LGBTQ child. Wherever you are on this journey right now, in this moment in time, you are not alone. So before we get into today's topic, I just have to share with you all that I am, I'm super excited and I am working so hard to get this episode recorded today, written and recorded and prepared because we are just hours away from welcoming a new puppy into our house. And as excited as I am, this, I've had other puppies in my house before and, and babies, and I know that the noise level in my house will definitely be going up very soon. So I thought, oh my goodness, I have to get this, I have to get this recorded today. So I am here today to, to bring you just a topic that I've been really wanting to talk to you about, and I thought I would take a break from interviews this episode to just take some time to return to some basics and just to kind of take a little breathing time. Um, while I— you know that I love interviewing and I love having the opportunity to interview and share these really amazing people that I've been able to share with you all and provide a platform for them to share their stories and, and their information with all of you. But at the same time, I do stay acutely aware of who you all are and what you might be going through or dealing with or asking or wanting to know. So I feel like circling back every few episodes to basics just feels really— it feels grounding to me and good to me, and I hope that it does to you too. So I am recording this right now as we're in the middle of this COVID-19 pandemic. I'm sure down the road as people listen to this, we will be through it and, and in a much different place and more hopefully beautiful place. But as I was really preparing for this episode, I was thinking very specifically of where we are Now it occurred to me that this topic is really relevant for any time of crisis or uncertainty. And so I, I want to share today with you some ways to protect your energy. What does that mean? Well, I'm gonna look at it from a couple of different angles, from two different angles. The first is recognizing your triggers. What triggers you? What state emotionally, mentally, physically are you typically in when you are more sensitive to triggers or being triggered? And the second is absorbing the energy of everyone around you or anyone that you come in contact with. So we're gonna look at triggers first, and I I'm sure some of you are, you know, triggers is a word that's used in lots of different ways right now. It's, it's one of those buzzwords. Um, but I'm kind of meaning it in a specific way. And I'm, I'm looking at triggers in two different ways. First, things that come at you from the outside, external triggers. So for example, coronavirus, a crisis with your child, difficult situation that you're dealing with them or something that they are going through, a death of a loved one, difficulties at work or losing a job or changing a job, moving, um, natural disasters. All of these things are external and are really things that you have no control over happening, right? Internal triggers are a lot of times kind of the result of those external triggers, right? But they can certainly just be there by themselves as well. And some examples of internal triggers would be fear, which right now is a huge one, right? Uncertainty, another big one right now. Sadness, anger, frustration. Internal triggers are more emotions, mental states, state of being, and these are all things that we can do something about, that we can work with and process and figure out ways to strengthen ourselves so we can deal with them, handle them in a healthy way. I was actually just saying to Connor today, we were talking about some things going on in our family, and I said, you know, we were going listing off emotions, things that we were feeling, you know, sadness and grief and frustration. And all emotions are good. It is good to feel emotions and to, to sit with them and, and really, you know, go through them. So I don't want you to— I guess part of this is not being afraid of your emotions. And I really wanted to give just a couple of, of examples because this is Truly what got me thinking about this topic today, um, I got to thinking about how our family has really responded to being in this shelter at home and to remotely learning and everybody working from home, and so many things have been so very, very different these past 5, 6 weeks. And it has worked out well. And I have just been really present with it and sitting with it and thinking, oh my goodness, there are all these things happening in the world. Most of it we have no control over, right? We only have control over what we do in our homes and our communities. And we're somewhat limited with our communities right now, right? And so I keep thinking, wow, I am so impressed with how my kids are handling this. And I've been feeling so calm myself and finding a lot of stability, clarity, and routine, and finding purpose, and trying new things, and doing things that I would never have time to do otherwise. And it's just been this kind of lovely energy in our house. And I've thought, why is this so different? Because I know as I talk to different people, people are experiencing this in all different ways. And what really occurred to me is that we've been through major crisis in this house and it lasted for an extensive period of time. It wasn't just a singular happening. Was multiple happenings and lots of time of uncertainty and lots of dealing with huge emotions. When we were in that place, you know, when it started up almost 3 years ago, I was nowhere near where I am now. None of us were in the ability to protect ourselves, to feed our souls in the way that we needed to feed our souls and our person to keep us strong and stable and clear and able to make good solid decisions. And I feel like, wow, looking back now, we really did learn so much. And I already knew, you know, that we'd learned a lot from all of that, but it has struck me being now in another, you know, kind of crisis situation, or a situation of uncertainty, and how much different the energy in our house feels this time. And it is just really lovely. So I thought, you know what, I need to share that with all of you and kind of share why I think it's different this time. So I want to move on to the other part of The other angle that I wanna look at, which is, you know, we looked at triggers and now I wanna look at absorbing others' energy. And I think this one is a little bit easier to understand because especially if you are a highly sensitive person. Now, this is not everyone is susceptible to this, but if you are a highly sensitive person, you are especially susceptible to this because you are naturally more in tune with the emotional and mental state of everyone everyone you come in contact with. And this has its pros and cons for sure. On one hand, showing compassion and being an active listener is really second nature to you, right? But on the other hand, if you're not careful, you can easily absorb the energy of whomever you are with, whomever you're talking with or listening to or just wherever this is coming from. So this is awesome if that energy is positive and happy, but it can be incredibly draining if it's negative. If you're listening to this show, you likely have teenagers, and you know that on any given day, a huge range of emotions can come flying at you. And this is the energy that I'm talking about specifically, but as you well know, it can come from anywhere. It can come from, you know, somebody at the grocery store or a friend who's having a really great day or a friend who's having a really bad day. It can come from, you know, a family member, anyone. But having teenagers, I think, makes us especially aware of what this feels like. So the tools that I'm gonna share with you will help you protect yourself from riding the waves of other people's emotions, you know, jumping on and feeling the high highs and feeling those low lows and from bouncing from emotion to emotion. And I don't want you to worry that you're gonna lose your ability to listen or be compassionate because you're not. In fact, you're gonna have more strength to do so. And you're going to have energy in reserve to stay in your life and do the things that you are passionate about and have access to wisdom and clarity when it's needed. So buckle your seatbelts. Here are my ways for you to protect yourself. And, you know, if you're driving, obviously you can't take notes, but If you're not, um, there's some good stuff in here. So definitely take some notes and, um, I will, I will put it in my show notes as well. So it'll be there kind of in short form for you. Um, but first and foremost, your cup needs to be full. By that I mean you can't be running on mental, emotional, or physical empty. You can't just be in that spot where you're like dragging all the time and you just are feeling like You know, every time it's just an, an eighth of a gallon and then you're, you're empty again. You need to get yourself to a place where you are full. You know, the, the best analogy I can think for this is the whole putting on your own oxygen mask first so you can assist those around you. Think for a moment about what fills your cup. What makes you feel whole? Or energized, or mentally clear, or physically strong? Make a list. This part is really specific to each individual, so I want you to take a little time or make a little note here that you want to take some time to do that. Second, I want you to try at least one of these tools, and I have, uh, you know, 5 tools that I'm going to list out here for you. To do. The first, and you all know that I'm a big fan of this, is gratitude. I have a sign hanging in my office that says, "Interrupt anxiety with gratitude," and I think it's one of those things where you can pop any word in there. Interrupt fear with gratitude, interrupt uncertainty with gratitude. Any negative emotion that you're having, you can interrupt that with with gratitude. And there are a million and one ways that you can do this. As long as your effort is sincere, the result will be too. I will tell you that I do keep a gratitude journal, as you know if you've been listening to me, but I also— fun fact about me— I love the those quarterly boxes that you can get. And one that I found last summer, I think, is called the Brogoli Box, and it's a mental health box. And it has, you know, you get all these really interesting and cool things to help you keep your mental health in good condition, right? And healthy condition. This past box that we received just happened to have a gratitude jar in it with these, you know, cute little perfect size Post-it notes and, and a little pencil. Now these are all things that I'm sure we all have laying around our house that we could make ourselves, but this was cute and kitschy and it sits on the middle of our dining room table and everybody uses it. And it is such an awesome little thing because, you know, I'll grab it and do it. I'll see the kids grab it and do it and it sits there and it's slowly full, you know, filling up and It's just one of those lovely reminders for everyone to, you know, one thing. What's one thing that you're grateful for? That's all it takes is sitting in that, that moment of one thing that you're grateful for. The second tool that I really love is visualization, using visualization. And there's a ton of science behind this, and I will, you know, link some cool articles that I've read on this, but the gist of using visualization is thinking about where you want to be, what state you'd like to be in, and really sitting with that and visualizing it, and visualizing it in a ton of detail. So let's say, I mean, I'll give you another example of when I really used this a lot was again with Connor and when Connor was away and I would sit and visualize him being healthy and fulfilled and finding his purpose and I would picture, you know, what he would look like potentially and I would picture his smile and I would think about how that would make me feel and how that would make Steve feel and Isabel and Grace and Rowan. And I would, you know, feel— I would get myself in the place where I could really feel those emotions. I could feel the energy, and I would just sit with that, and I would put that out into the universe. I'll share with you, like I said earlier, a couple of links that really show, uh, or give you the science behind why this works. So stay tuned for that. The next tool is to move your body. And I know this is a, you know, an one that you hear all over the place that will, that can help in so many different ways, but moving your body and it doesn't matter how you can walk, you can run, You can do yoga. You can kickbox. Right now, I know that we're a little bit limited on things that we can do, but we can all go outside and walk. We can all do yoga in our houses somewhere. What, what makes you feel good? What makes your body feel good? Do it. The next is affirmations. We have extraordinary power to shift our mindset, which then shifts our life. Affirmations are really two parts, right? We can't rely on words alone to create a shift. We must allow those words to inspire an action or create awareness. Here's how I approach affirmations. I have a list of ones and it's constantly changing, but whatever I'm currently using, I, again, I sit with those. I say them either out loud or to myself, and then I take action. I take action on the ones where they are actionable. That is my advice to you is to use affirmations. Try using affirmations in that way. If you've never used them before, you never know, you might find a new tool that you love, I will, again, I will list 10 of my favorite in the show notes and I'll list my little instructions for how to use them best in the ways that I think that they are most effective. The fifth tool that I wanna share with you is meditation. And you know that I love meditation and meditating, and it is one of my very favorite ways for just getting grounded and centered and focused. You know, it's a really lovely form of self-care. And for me, it's, you know, kind of a gift that I give to myself of stillness and quiet. And it's one that I can access at any time, no matter what chaos is going on in my house or in the world. I will share a couple of meditations with you in the show notes as well, so you can try those. So moving on to, those were my tools. So moving on to the next way that you can really protect yourself and learn to shore yourself up is talk to a professional. Talking with a professional will help you really process through your needs and help you process through things that come up as you're processing through your needs or processing through your emotions. And doing this will really give you clarity on ways to protect your energy, the ways that are going to serve you best and help you best. Fourth, set healthy boundaries. Now, this one's huge, and I will do an entire episode on it soon. For the sake of this episode and just keeping it super, super simple, I want you to think of setting boundaries with people, activities, or commitments that are energy suckers. So again, this will be, uh, this will be, is another one that will require some reflection on your part and just some time to sit with it and really think about it. But I promise, promise I will return to this topic soon so we can take a deep dive into it and, and talk about it because this one is huge. And finally, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice all of these tools and techniques that work for you. The more that you practice, the more that you practice keeping your cup full and practice healthy boundaries, the more prepared you will be for any situation. And I know you can do this. So there you have it. This is where I'm gonna end for today, and I am just so happy that you joined me. Remember, at the very, very least, to take just a few minutes each day to just breathe, to focus on your breath, and calm and center yourself. This will give you strength and clarity. Just breathe. I also wanted to announce really quickly before I sign off that I just launched my biweekly newsletter that will post on the opposite weeks of this podcast. So please sign up for it. It will have great content and fun stories, and I can't wait to share it with all of you. So jump on over to my website, you can sign up right there. And finally, I would be so grateful if you would review Just Breathe and share it with anyone who needs to know that they are not alone. Until next time.