N.A.M.E. It

May is Mental Health Awareness Month! It is the best time to de-stigmatize the conversation around mental health. The good news, everyday people are starting to talk more and more about mental health challenges. The bad news, not all of the conversations are de-stigmatized. There are so many issues that stand in the way of de-stigmatizing the conversation. So much intersectionality that influences the mental health of a person. We experience emotion in everything that we do, say, hear, feel, all of our senses. We FEEL more than we often want to and then turn around and behave as if our feelings give us the ultimate right to behave any way that we choose. WHEW! And this is where people get stuck. The conversations around mental health have been stuck in this idea that our feelings allow us just to behave anyway that we wish. THIS IS SUPER FALSE. We are very much allowed to FEEL; we are not always allowed to BEHAVE in the way that we FEEL. People have a hard time separating FEELINGS & BEHAVIOR. They are not the same. I need to give myself grace when I feel less than. I don’t need to shrink because I feel less than. Have I explored WHY I feel less than in the moment that I felt less than. And less than what? Less than enough? Less than human? Less than another person? The exploration behind the emotions is where not enough people take the time to explore. And then, when we have conversations about mental health, and we haven’t explored our own, we invite the stigma into the conversation because you carry your own biases into the conversation (knowingly or unknowingly). I often have to remind myself that my feelings about a situation are valid; however, my choices surrounding those feelings may carry judgement from others and even shame within myself. While I can’t control what others think, I can control the shame that I feel internally about my behaviors. Let’s take this example from my life: I don’t often get the chance to take or pick my son up from school (due to my work schedule). Between his father and my mother, the village comes through to make sure that my son is taken care of in that regard. I had to really pull the thread on my true feelings behind not being able to take my son to school. While initially it was a feeling of sadness, but when I checked my feelings wheel it was really more a feeling of guilt. As his mother why was I not able to take him to school, and pick him up, and go to work. I should be able to do it all. And I often tried to do it all, and when I couldn’t do it all, I felt this mom guilt. This is such a real feeling for lots of mothers. There are different reasons behind it, but all very real feelings. So, my behavior in this situation is trying to do all the things, even though I knew it was impossible, and when I couldn’t get all of the things done…mom guilt…which is really mom shame enters the chat. I would tell myself that I wasn’t a good mother because I wasn’t there enough for my child (and we are just talking about taking and picking up from school here). The shame and inner critic thoughts were not healthy for the stability of my mental health. While it is fine to feel the guilt, as a mom, it will happen from time to time. It is the behavior of replacing that guilt with shame and trying to make up for it by wearing myself out completely that was the problem. Why would I reveal this to you? Well, this is what destigmatizing the conversation looks like in real time. It looks like being able to be honest with yourself about your true emotions, acknowledging that they exist, and then deciding what I am going to do about them. For this situation, I was honest with myself that I was initially sad about not being able to take my son to school. Then I dug a little deeper, and realized that I actually felt guilt about it, and started to notice that shame crept in too. After noticing and acknowledging, I have to do something about it, otherwise I will continue in a shame cycle every time I can’t be there for my son. Just knowing that shame exists there, I have to figure out the cycle and try to break it. What cues the shame to begin, what behaviors do I attach to shame that aren’t healthy, and what can I do to reframe the messages that I am telling myself about it. This is the work to change behavior that is attached to feelings. If I can’t just name the feeling, then I can’t identify how to truly work through it. Every situation will be different. Every situation won’t be about shame. Let’s take a happy emotional situation. I recently got a new 9am -5pm job. I recognized that I felt happiness about getting this new position. When I dug deeper I realized that I was optimistic and hopeful about all the things that this new job will bring for work-life balance for my life. Since then, I realize that when I am happy I tend to spend more money. I go out to eat more, and I want to shop for clothes, etc. The spending is the behavior that I have placed with happiness. I would never have known that if I didn’t stop to truly recognize that that feeling and behavior are connected to each other in my life. I am thankful that isn’t an issue for my life or a negative impact to my mental health, but it could be if I ever started to spend excessively or over my budget. Noticing these emotional/behavioral attachments matter. Whether you believe it is a problem or not. You associate behaviors with certain feelings and emotions. Defining which ones, you want to change vs which ones aren’t an issue should be a practice for your daily life. It should be considered a part of your emotional self-care ritual. While you may not discover all of the attachments in one sitting, even if you discover two, it can help you to live better. It can help you break cycles of behavior that you don’t like. And sometimes you need someone to talk it through with you. Someone who can ask you the right questions to get to the right endpoint. This is the work that I do as a coach! I help others N.A.M.E. their emotions and behaviors so that they can move on toward the life that they want to live. N.A.M.E. stands for Notice, Acknowledge, Manage, Expectations! These 4 steps are a part of THE WORK! The 4 steps truly help you to find your inner BEAUTY! Build your Emotional Awareness with me starting TODAY!