Holding the 'goodness'...

On panic attacks, intrusive thoughts, disappointment and increasing the capacity to hold goodness...

Hello lovely one

How is your heart feeling today?

So many people responded to last week’s letter to express their own tenderness in this season and it was comforting to know that I am not the only one holding so many multitudes within me at this time. Thank you… it means so much to me to be witnessed in my whole messy humanness.

One of the things that I have been exploring recently within myself is the ability to hold ‘goodness’ in my system. Today I am writing more on this thread and would love to take you with me on my meandering thought pathway…

I want to say here, I am not really a fan of the word ‘good’ on the whole because it conjures up images of perfect behaviour and performative actions… however in this context it is the only word that sits right for me. It covers a multitude of sensations and feelings really… goodness to me is pleasure, joy, love, kindness, connection, happiness, playfulness, creativity, excitement, hope, it is all of the delicious and yummy feelings that flood our system with ‘goodness’… like a rich nutrient dense meal that tastes good and makes you feel amazing. This is what I mean when I talk about ‘goodness’.

Soaking up the goodness on a family walk at the weekend

Spiralling thoughts…

One of the things I have (and still do) struggled with for a long time is intrusive thoughts. I didn’t know this was what they were until a professional named them a few years ago as I had always thought that intrusive thoughts were big traumatic stories, like thinking about dropping your baby down the stairs or really harming yourself or someone else, but for me they are more like sneaky subtle thoughts that jump in when things are going OK. My brain likes to dangle the potential that, at any moment, things suddenly won’t be OK! That I won’t be OK.

One of the most intrusive thoughts that comes in repeatedly for me is that at any moment I might spiral into a panic attack… having experienced them since my late teens.

For anyone who has experienced panic attacks you will know that the feelings and sensations are excruciating and even though I have danced with these for pretty much my whole adult life, I still find it hard to trust that they will pass when they arise.

Since becoming a Mother, the fear of these panic attacks taking hold has grown significantly because it is very, very hard to ‘mask’ the sensations and carry on as ‘normal’ when you are also trying to take care of two little humans.

Familiar sensations

My panic attacks have ebbed and flowed a lot in my life. Each time new practices are implemented and I find ways to manage them, but around 18 months ago I started to have them in the mornings when I was alone with my daughters.

They felt slightly different to the ones I had had before. Very physiological and in the body rather than the mind. A racing heart, the feeling of terror coursing through my body for no obvious reason, the nausea and fear of vomiting, the sensitivity to light and sound, the inability to concentrate and string a coherent sentence together… the shakiness that comes from the inside out. All while I was trying to get breakfast made, children dressed, myself vaguely ‘together’ in order to leave the house and begin our day.

I had to sit with the sensations, alone, with my children, trying not to spiral into complete panic as I didn’t want to upset or scare them.

After this happened a few times I started to fear the mornings. I started to fear the potential of a panic attack and therefore started to fear being alone with the girls in the mornings incase it happened again.

Which it did. Multiple times. And it was horribly uncomfortable (but I survived).

The knock on impact of this was that it started to lead to me waking up (early) and laying in bed (because my littlest sleeps in our bed for most of the night and would wake if I left the room) trying so hard not to let my spiraling thoughts take me into a full blown meltdown. Sometimes I won. Most of the time I didn’t, for a while.

Even on the days when I woke up and didn’t feel the discomfort of the anxiety in my body, very soon my mind would take me down the path of ‘what if’ and the sensations would soon make their presence known.

I was trapped in a spiral of panicking about the possibilty of having a panic attack. I was addicted to the intrusive thoughts and the repeating pathway that my dark thoughts would take me down.

Making meaning

Every time it happened I would make these experiences ‘mean’ something negative about myself. An incapable Mother. A burden to my husband. A disappointment to my clients.

Part of the repeating cycle was the langauge I used against myself. Broken. Damaged. Weak. A burden.

I would think constantly about how awful it was that my poor children had to have a Mother ‘like me’.

The missing piece in this process, that in hindsight I can now clearly see, was compassion and kindness, but at the time I just felt despair and hopelessness and spoke awful words to the parts of me who were ‘ruining’ my life. I found it particularly challenging because when I looked around me at my life all was well.

I had everything I needed and so much of what I dreamed of… and yet… here was my mind ‘spoiling’ things… again.

It was only when I spoke to a mental health professional that she explained this as panic disorder… and I started to understand that it was not my body letting me down… but in fact it was the spiralling pattern of intrusive thoughts that would activate a cascade of physiological sensations in my body. And actually my body was responding in the way that it was ‘meant to’ when under threat. Of course the threat itself wasn’t an actual threat, but parts of me perceived it to be.

Instead of seeing myself as too sensitive, unable to cope and as weak and pathetic, I started to see myself through a more gentle view point — with the help of my therapist I would like to add — I don’t know that I would have got ‘there’ without her.

Watching the mist rise… finding the goodness once more.

Facing my nemesis: disappointment

A big part of healing and supporting myself through this phase has been realising that for so long ‘goodness’ has actually felt unsafe in my system. The intrusive thoughts have been coming in to ‘protect’ me.

When I was in a place of struggle and discomfort, my nervous system actually felt more stable there in a bizarre way. It was easier for me to be in a place of holding suffering and struggle and discomfort than it was for me to hold ‘goodness’.

Parts of me felt mistrusing of these ‘good’ feelings because they might not last and then I would have to meet my old friend ‘disappointment’ in all her many forms.

Feeling good was effectively signaling danger because of course at some point there will be a disappointment, or a wobble. I will feel unwell or have a difficult moment, and what if I couldn’t handle that? I realised that I haven’t wanted to get too familar with ‘goodness’ because it could be taken away from me at any time. And then what?

I have come to realise my complex relationship with disappointment, amongst other emotions. The grief and the upset that comes from disappointment is monumental to the younger parts of me. Neither do I want to feel disappointed in myself or even worse… disappoint others. So, I have held the ‘good’ things at arms length. That way I protect myself from the risk of disappointment.

Of course it doesn’t work like that… by controlling situations to avoid disappointment, I have also disconnected myself from joy and the rich depth of life that I so long for.

I have been starving myself of life.

To become aware of this part of me, the part so utterly terrified of what it may mean to let ‘goodness’ seep into her system, was a hugely pivotal moment.

What if was strong enough to hold both in my system? What if I could be present and enjoy the ‘goodness’ and then also be present to the unavoidable lower moments in life? Would I cope with that?

There was only one way to find out.

Shared suffering

One of the threads I have been exploring around my capacity to hold ‘goodness’, is the connection of ‘shared suffering’… and how for so long it has felt safer for me to express outwardly my struggles over my celebrations. In a world that has so much pain and suffering, in many different forms, it feels quite vulnerable to express ‘good’ feelings.

Can I really experience ‘goodness’ as a Mother when the narrative is so often negative?

You have to lose yourself, you have to sacrifice your own needs, you have to get it ‘right’ by bypassing your own sense of self… don’t you? Isn’t that one of the unwritten rules of being a Mother?

As someone who has rarely felt they ‘belonged’ in life and always felt a little of an outsider, when I found myself in Motherhood I finally felt a sense of belonging. It felt right to be in that place… however in order to be accepted I have to fit a certain expectation of what a Mother is, right? To actually share the ‘goodness’ in Motherhood felt like I might be cast out of this circle I had finally been accepted into, so I have closed that part of me off and built my identity around the struggles and the hardships.

On social media it has almost gone full circle from the ‘highlight reel’ of all the ways our lives are going well to showing our lowest points, our struggles, our pain. I know that these are important aspects of being human that need to be witnessed in safe places, but I suspect that I have been filtering myself a little more towards sharing my struggles because there is a fear that by showing the ‘goodness’ I will be rejected, or not resonated with, or seen as someone who is not relatable because my life is just too ‘good’.

The reality is that when I write and share about the darker moments of life and the difficulties, the outpouring of connection is usually far more than if I was to write about the ‘goodness’… I wonder if that is because it is more rare to see this side of people, or because it touches people in a different way? I don’t know the answer to this and it is definitely not the reason I share my struggles through my writing… but it is something that I now have in my awareness and I am curious about it.

The ‘goodness’ simply doesn’t always feel safe to rest in, so my mind has developed a pattern to make a quick getaway in order to protect me.

Slow progress is still progress

Over the past year I have been working with a therapist, amongst other things to support my nervous system and wellbeing. At times I have wanted to throw the towel in… it is a big financial committment, in fact it is the thing I spend most on each month (second to childcare!)… but something keeps me going back because actually, while week to week it often feels like I am not getting ‘anywhere’ I have found that on reflection I am a very different person to the one that stepped into those sessions at the start of the year.

I haven’t had a massive leap from ‘there’ to ‘here’… I have not had any big cathartic experience… and yet over time the accumulative effects of anchoring to this weekly session and doing ‘the work’ to accept, honour and process my lived experience so far, has given me opportunity to see, not just the parts of me that are scared and protective and running on old stories, but new parts that actually are extremely resilient, extremely capable and very much a loving presence.

Finding goodness in my internal world instead of the external

Re-acquaniting myself with ‘goodness’ from within…

And so begins the practice of re-acquainting myself with ‘goodness’, and a particularl kind of goodness that comes from within. I can no longer rely on outside sources to access these sensations, it has to come from my internal world, this way I will never be able to ‘lose’ it. It is innate.

As with any changes we want to embody, I feel that it is important to take things gently, we need to expand our capacity in baby steps and take many pauses along the way to catch our breath and integrate a new way of being.

So the past few months have been very much focused on growing, and increasing, my capacity to hold this ‘goodness’ with a sense of steadiness. I want this to stick… and so slowly is really the only route I can take.

While this is still very much a work in progress (and probably always will be) I wanted to share some of the ways that I have been gently welcoming in a little more ‘good’ and expanding my capacity to hold this ‘goodness’ in my system.

Here is what I am exploring right now…

• Noticing if I feel panicky or uncomfortable and getting curious with it. Which part of me doesn’t feel safe? What can I do to reassure that part that in this moment I am OK to experience this? How can I gradually, day by day, allow in a little more of the ‘good’ sensations and sit with them in my system?

• Reminding myself what actually feels good to me as an individual. Certain ways of being touched, certain movements, certain textures, certain pressures… what feels truely enjoyable to me?

• Staying a few moments longer than before in the deliciousness of life… letting myself, wherever possible, to be with the feeling for a few more moments rather than rushing to the next task. This is a particularly pleasant practice to do in a lovely hot shower, or when moisturising your body.

• Saying to myself words like… “I am practising receiving goodness and it is OK if this feels a little stretchy. I am worthy of feeling good. I am safe to experience goodness. Goodness is healing to me and isn’t here to harm.”

• Choosing movement that feels good. Taking a moment to ask myself whether something actually feels good and if it does, letting myself be with that practice. Dancing. Stretching. Rolling around on the floor. Shaking. I particularly love a good side body stretch at the moment so I am ensuring that I start my days with this.

• Self touch. Finding things that feel good in my body through my own touch such as self massage (the feet, the shoulders and the face are usually good places to start), rubbing my hand over my heart or tapping my chest lightly (or firmly depending on the day), stroking my inner arms.

• Reminding myself that I am innately worthy of feeling good and I don’t have to ‘earn’ it with outside productivity.

• Being aware of beauty around me and connecting to a sense of awe. Pausing a little longer to observe a beautiful sky, the moon, the colours of autumn. My children are wonderful reminders of this as they will point things out and stand and be mesmerised by them without any sense of urgency.

• Nervous system practices to ensure that alongside these new experiences I am consistently showing up to soothe and settle myself and process new sensations. This isn’t about being calm all the time, it is about finding ways to express the feelings that come up… whether that is grief, anger, frustration, despair… or excitement, satisfaction, joy and pleasure. Increasing my capacity to hold goodness also increases my capacity to hold the more challenging emotions.

• Saying NO to things that really don’t feel good to me. Every time I do this with honesty I am showing myself the evidence that I can choose things that DO feel good and still be OK.

• Really following my sacral nudges and listening to my inner energy by choosing satisfaction. As a Manifesting Generator with sacral authority in Human Design my body is my compass and something that feels deeply satisfying to me, or exciting, is worth pursuing even if I don’t know where it will take me. Trusting this is yet another way of valuing my own energy and increasing my ability to work with ‘the good’.

• Slowing down. Ultimately if we are rushing through life we simply cannot bathe in the ‘goodness’ and let it settle in to our being. So I am working on literally slowing the pace that I do things to allow myself a chance to actually acknowledge that something feels good in my system and then I can consciously choose to notice it, and be with it.

Every day I am constantly awake to, and aware of, ways I can build up the evidence bank in my system that ‘goodness’ is safe for me. That it is OK for me to truly drop in and be present to the magical moments of life and that does not mean I will have to counterbalance that with something negative.

The beauty of this process is, that when things are challenging, I have started to create a resource well internally that I can turn to in order to steady myself and remind myself that I can hold both.

Slowly, gently, day by day, I am increasing my capacity to hold the ‘goodness’ of life.

I would love to know more about your relationship with ‘goodness’ if you feel called to share with me.

While I know that this is very much an ongoing practice, I feel that this awareness has already had a profound impact on me and I can’t ‘unsee’ it. Perhaps you feel the same?

Until next time

With love

Lauren

xxx

PS… if you are local to my studio in Kent I have one space left for my Yoga Nidra Restore Session on Friday 21st November and bookings are now open for our Women’s Circle on 5th December. You can explore all the studio offerings here.

PPS… if you are in the world of creating your heart and soul work and wish to step into a four day free email experience guiding you into deeper relationship with your business through the lens of Human Design, Yoga Nidra and more… please do join The Gateway here.

Hello to anyone who is new here… I am Lauren. A Mother of two daughters, Writer, Women’s Circle Facilitator, Sacred Business Mentor & Guide, Soul Branding & Website Creator and multi-dimensional human being. I walk with, and hold space for, others who are treading the tender path of their heart and soul work. You can find out more about this space and what to expect here. If you wish to be held in a deeper way do consider joining The Balm membership for restorative practices, sacred heart work offerings and more…

If you enjoyed this piece and wish to explore my other spaces please use the links below to explore…

Motherhood Essays
Self-Tending Practices
The Unravelling Podcast
Human Design
Work With Me