Practicing Mindfulness
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A sense of mental calmness and clarity achieved through focusing your awareness on the present moment, without passing judgments. Practicing mindfulness involves patiently observing and accepting your own thoughts, feelings, and sensations as they occur naturally.
This practice may not be easy, or feel natural at first, as it requires you to become more accountable for identifying, shedding, and replacing dysfunctional attitudes, beliefs, and responses that have been learned and reinforced over time. It’s important to note that these attitudes, beliefs, and responses were likely adopted out of self-protection, and served a function at some point — so, with mindfulness also comes a necessary self-forgiveness for the patterns that no longer serve you today.
Furthermore, when you continue to practice thinking and acting in a more mindful way, you are actually creating and reinforcing new neural connections (a concept known as neuroplasticity). What this means is that you are, through repetition, re-wiring the way your brain interprets information from the world around you.
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Body Scans:
Get in a comfortable position, ideally laying down. Close your eyes and begin by focusing on your breath. Then bring your attention to each part your body, starting with your head or feet and working your way down or up. As you scan each body part, pay close attention to any sensations (such as warmth, tingling, or tension). Acknowledge, and breath into, these sensations without assigning meaning or passing judgements. After you finish scanning, take a moment to visualize your body as a whole.
5-4-3-2-1 Grounding Technique:
Acknowledge 5 things you can see, 4 things you can feel/touch, 3 things you can hear, 2 things you can smell, and 1 thing you can taste.
Distress Tolerance Skills
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One’s ability to cope and rebound from from stressful life events, without resorting to unhealthy behaviors. Distress tolerance includes aspects like emotional regulation, impulse control, acceptance, self-soothing, and problem-solving.
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Naming feelings & sensations:
Label, identify, and put into words what your are experiencing. Take notice of the specific emotional and physical responses your body is having to whatever has caused you distress. You can try doing this through spoken word, journaling, singing, body scans, etc.
Breathwork, somatics, & movement:
Focus on slowing and guiding the rhythm of your inhales, holds, and exhales. You can intentionally activate the vagus nerve to ease distress and anxiety by adding some humming, gargling, chanting, etc. You can also incorporate tapping, squeezing, and various forms of bilateral stimulation (more on this to come). Next, try to get your body moving with a preferred form of exercise (like yoga, dance, running, etc.). One of my personal favorites (obviously) is yoga, as I feel a sense of alignment and grounding throughout my body while doing it (plus a magical kick of endorphins). Also, the continued practice helps build both strength and confidence.
Essential oils & mindful showers:
Engage your senses!!! Smell something nice—it doesn’t have to be essential oils—it can be the smell of freshly cut grass, baked goods, your dog’s paws… whatever has been associated with more positive emotions in the past. You can also hop in the shower and tune into the sensations (e.g., temperature, pressure, smells, sounds) that come with the water, steam, soaps, and scrubs touching your body. Imagine that the shower is washing away your stresses—a psyche cleaning, if you will.
Weighted blankets & hugging:
A little deep pressure therapy to close us out! Maximize the production of nervous system soothing hormones by grabbing a friend, family member, loved one, pet, etc., to snuggle with. If one isn’t available, or this is not for you, try simulating the experience with the pressure from a weighted blanket, body pillows, or similar alternative.
Please also fuel your body with nourishing foods, sleep, and hygiene practices. Self-care is often neglected during distress, and this can cause or worsen depressive symptoms.
Controlled Breathing Exercises
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Eases physiological symptoms of stress/anxiety
Activates the parasympathetic nervous system, which prepares your organs for “rest and digest”
Prevents/stops hyperventilation during panic
Improves lung capacity when practices regularly
Helps relieve insomnia and other sleep challenges
Re-focuses your mind onto the present moment if overwhelmed by intrusive/ruminative thoughts
Builds confidence in your ability to self-regulate
Empowers you to feel more in control of your responses to triggers/stressors
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Box Breathing:
Inhale for 4 seconds.
Hold for 4 seconds.
Exhale for 4 seconds.
Hold for 4 seconds.
Repeat!
4-7-8 Breathing:
Inhale for 4 seconds.
Hold for 7 seconds.
Exhale for 8 seconds.
Repeat!
Tips
Controlled breathing can be done effectively in a wide range of postures, such as sitting cross-legged with hands on your lap or laying down with one hand on the belly and one on the heart—do whatever feels most comfortable in the moment
Inhale through the nose (sipping in extra air through the mouth, at the top of your breath, if you’d like) and exhale out the mouth
Inhaling into your belly (or diaphragm) rather than your chest will allow you to take in more oxygen
Psychopharmacology Infographic
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This is a very difficult decision to make, as there are clearly many pros and cons that may vary in importance to each individual. I highly suggest A) speaking with both your psychotherapist and your psychiatrist before making a decision, and B) asking them to remain in contact throughout the course of your medication use—this is considered “best practice.”
Counselors on Social Media
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In the ACA article titled, “The Rise of Counselors on Social Media” (Phillips, 2022), the author discusses the emergence of mental health professionals effectively using social media as a platform for outreach and advocacy. Some of the major takeaways from this article, regarding the benefits of this emergence, include:
Making psychological education more accessible
Raising awareness on and destigmatizing mental health challenges
Encouraging more people to seek mental health services
Allowing people to better vet the professionals they are choosing to rely on for information/services, given that social media comes with some degree of self-disclosure
Some of the safeguards counselors (such as myself) have put in place to mitigate unethical behavior on social media include:
Making social media part of the the conversation in sessions (e.g., asking how the clients feels about it)
Setting professional boundaries , such as not allowing private conversations (DMs) through social media
Never discussing client information, even with a pseudonym