Cultivating Resiliency part 1

How can we cultivate resiliency? What is resiliency and is there a way to strengthen it? How does being resilient change our lives and the ways we cope?

Resilience is defined by the ability to bounce back after trauma, to cope with or to heal after a crisis. We think of bouncing back after health challenges such as cancer, heart surgery, joint replacements, serious infection, root cannals, as recuperating, but actually we never recuperate to be exactly as we were. We may have scars, we may have new body parts, we may have a new diet or restrictions on activities or we may be advised to increase physical activity. With an on-going illness such as diabetes, MS, CP, Lupus, Parkinson’s, we may think of resilience more in terms of attitude and determination. We practice gratitude for what we have, we choose to be disciplined about therapy and we ask for help and guidance in order to enhance our lives. We continue those activities we love as best we can. Resilience after pregnancy doesn’t mean we bounce back to the person we were, even if we get our figure back. Our hearts, emotions, minds, time, stamina, are all stretched, sometimes to the limit. We give up sleep, autonomy, our own comfort; even our friendships may change. But we live more fully, deeply, richly. So resilience is not only coping or bouncing back or healing but change, growth, and transformation.

Resilience after an emotional crisis is a sign of healthy moving forward. Whether it is a loss of a loved one or our relationship with someone, a way of life or a job, a home or homeland, a dream or our abilities, we mourn and let go. Sometimes this happens in cycles, a wave of rising and falling, as we are reminded of what has been altered, perhaps by an anniversary, a special place, children and grandchildren, a certain fragrance or song. When we are resilient, we are able to feel whatever it is we are feeling, then we move on to another feeling which may be relief, gratitude, love, or acceptance. We may find ways to express our feelings through art, journaling, a support group or a friend's listening ear; we may choose to weep, scream, pound our fists; or we may draw, pray, dance, walk by a lake. But we don’t stay stuck in the past. We remember we have other relationships, ideas, projects, homes, dreams and a life to fill. We may be more compassionate; we have gained insight, wisdom and new perspectives.  

  

Michael was the love of my life. He made me laugh and he listened to me, he took me seriously. He was the first person I ever told, “I am an artist.” He healed past physical and psychological abuse with his affection. He was fun to travel with, always ready to explore, gregarious and enthusiastic. He also had wide mood swings. Some days he couldn’t get out of bed, some days he couldn’t sleep. He would call me from another state or even disappear across the border and not call at all. He would bring home people he had met at the bar at 3 am. He was also suicidal, telling me that he didn’t want to live daily, that life was too abrasive. With a diagnosis of bipolar disorder, we began to understand his suffering was not going to be cured by will alone.

We lived in Santa Fe, a Mecca for alternative healing, and I began to search for alternatives to prescription drugs. Earthwalks for Health was part of my search. Earthwalks connected us to indigenous artists and local sages for a week-end of learning about their healing practices. This is how I met Joan Logghe, beloved Santa Fe poet.

           

 Joan was the founder of Write Action, a writing support group. I was writing poetry with another group at the time and encouraged Michael to attend Joan’s group. He found it satisfying to pour out his brutally honest thoughts on paper and not be judged. One week, he couldn’t attend because he was going out of town so I suggested that I could go and “keep his seat warm.” I loved it and we continued attending together weekly. We felt supported and accepted. It was energizing to hear common themes go around the circle and to be reassured that coping with Michael’s moods was not isolating us.

            

Joan had worked with Natalie Goldberg and used the same basic writing instruction that so many writing instructors and writing groups would come to rely on: spontaneous timed writing. However, Joan used poems as prompts. 

Eventually Michael became more and more mentally unstable and one night he gathered up the courage to kill himself. I wept until my eyes were swollen shut but I was released from care-giving and uplifted by a burst of creative energy. To be able to pour out my grieving heart onto the page in the writing groups was cathartic. To feel that others cared was life-saving. From that point on, writing became not only a way of self-expression but a life raft that saved me from drowning. When emotions feel overwhelming, writing helps me to stay focused. Writing helps me to analyze and understand what I am feeling and to make a shift from emotion to clarity.

There is no sharp dividing line between self-repair and self-realization. All creative activity is a kind of do-it-yourself therapy, an attempt to come to terms with traumatizing challenges –Arthur Koestler

What I learned about resiliency is that it is important to name and claim your emotions. When we feel something, the amygdala part of the brain lights up. This is called our flight or fight center. Studies confirm changes take place in the brain when we feel or name our feelings. “When you put feelings into words,” wrote UCLA psychologist Matthew Lieberman in an article in UCLA Today ”you’re activating this prefrontal region and seeing a reduced response in the amygdala. In the same way you hit the brake when you’re driving when you see a yellow light, when you put feelings into words, you seem to be hitting the brakes on your emotional responses.”

In one MRI study, appropriately titled "Putting Feelings into Words" participants viewed pictures of people with emotional facial expressions. Predictably, each participant's amygdala activated to the emotions in the picture. But when they were asked to name the emotion, the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex activated and reduced the emotional amygdala reactivity. In other words, consciously recognizing the emotions reduced their impact.

Suppressing emotions doesn't work and can backfire on you. Gross found that people who tried to suppress a negative emotional experience failed to do so. While they thought they looked fine outwardly, inwardly their limbic system was just as aroused as without suppression, and in some cases, even more aroused.

To reduce arousal, you need to use just a few words to describe an emotion, and ideally use symbolic language, which means using indirect metaphors, metrics, and simplifications of your experience. This requires you to activate your prefrontal cortex, which reduces the arousal in the limbic system. Here's the bottom line: describe an emotion in just a word or two, and it helps reduce the emotion.

http://www.brainfacts.org/sensing-thinking-behaving/mood/articles/2015/fear-and-the-brain-an-introduction/

Therefore, the emotions move from the amagdala to the prefrontal cortex, which decides how to respond. Here is where writing about our experiences not only sends helpful chemicals such as dopamine and serotonin to the brain, but the emotions move from flight or fight to determine how best to respond.

• How do you feel when you wake up? At the end of the day? After work? After your evening activities? Is there a way to express what you are feeling?
• Are you sad/frustrated/angry/lonely/upset/frightened?
• Are you relaxed/filled/content/happy/satisfied/joyful/curious?
• Keep a feeling journal and note the ups and down through-out a day.
• Chose an emotion and write to it, telling it you let it go. Use Joy Harjo’s poem I Give You Back as a prompt:

I Give You Back 

                                            

I release you, my beautiful and terrible

fear. I release you. You were my beloved

and hated twin, but now, I don't know you

as myself. I release you with all the

pain I would know at the death of

my children.

You are not my blood anymore.

Memoir: how to deal with emotional overload

When writing memoir, it is inevitable that emotions will rise to the surface as we describe both happy and sad memories. Sometimes what we write stirs the caldron of unresolved emotions. Rage, guilt, shame, hurt, and fear can all surge back immediately, even if we have done everything we can to heal, from therapy to moving on to a new life. While sifting through the details of the past, we may suddenly have revelations that shed new light on our motivations and our personalities, and on others as well. These revelations can range from shame or embarrassment at choices we made and/ or our naiveté or culpability, anger at ourselves that we didn’t act on inner guidance, anger at others for mistreatment or ignorance of our suffering, regret that we didn’t make wiser choices or ask for help, or forgiveness of our innocence and ignorance and understanding or tenderness towards ourselves and others.

Scientists who examined the brain discovered that the center of memory lies close to the center of emotion, and that reading sensual details of smell, taste, sound, sight and touch trigger the brain to believe the sensations are real. Logically, it makes sense that these sensations register as real when we write about them as much as when we read about them. Your body retains cellular memoires that can be triggered by writing your experiences down.

So what can we do? We want to write from a place of telling our stories, not seeking revenge, as victors, not as victims, as wiser, not embroiled in emotional turmoil. The place for expelling the emotional turmoil is in our journal but for readers, we want our reflections to resonate: what the past means, what lessons we have learned, what we have gained. The take-away.

It is important to take care of ourselves as surprisingly, these emotional states can arise again and again in different ways and in different levels of intensity as we progress from writing to rewrites and through further revisions. The emotions may change: we may no longer feel softened by the naiveté of our younger self, we may feel anger or regret that we had not felt before, the injustices we suffered may be more blatant or relationships may take on nuances we hadn’t noticed when we were just getting the story down.

Ways to  take care of ourselves:

•  walk or do yoga or dance, hang out in nature, feel the sun on your face or sit by a body of water, massage, cuddle, have sex, eat healthy foods. Any activity that occupies your immediate attention and gives you a break from over-thinking can help soothe and restore
•  talk with a trusted friend or counselor, read uplifting messages, express love for family and friends, feel heard, discuss other topics, laughter
• create and repeat positive affirmations, participate in a  spiritual community, sing, chant or listen to music, meditation and prayer: quiet the mind down
•  make art or visit a museum, being inspired by others’ work will raise your vibration

Other possibilities:

• write a letter to someone you admire, expressing your admiration and gratitude
• write a letter to someone in your writing world (a writing partner, an imaginary agent or editor, a writer you admire) explaining what you are working on and your intended goals
• write a letter to a reader, explaining why you need to write your story     

• Keep a blessing journal:

Every day write down three blessings. Note any blessings such as a friend called, a new book to read, a good meal, a cleaned kitchen, a gorgeous sunset, an inspiring poem, help with a project, a favorite song, a great parking spot, the bus on time, a smile from a stranger

• If the material is too hard to write, write in third person and/or turn it into fiction

You can go back and rewrite in first person memoir. Sometimes we need to the distance of third person to get our emotions on the page. Turning it fiction will give us permission to explore other points of view and perspectives.

• Write your story with a successful outcome or amazing synchronicities or with the ending you dream of. 

Give yourself a break from the dissection of your self to the vision of what you can be. I once threw a “Come as you want to be” party. I arrived dressed up for my trip to accept the Nobel Prize. Even though it was a fantasy, it gave me momentum to keep going at a time when I felt discouraged. The Nobel Prize may be out of reach but I published two books of poetry and have performed for hundreds of audience members, have won four grants and have been able to teach in prisons and non-profits, schools and healing centers. Besides my work appearing in literary journals and anthologies, I had an article published in Poets & Writers magazine and I have been a community editor for the Saint Paul Almanac.

• Take a break and write something else: poerty, short story, flash fiction

Come as you want to be as you rewrite your work: wiser, stronger, happier, beloved, and doing what you love to do. Keep your vision of your published book in your hand, your audience enthralled. Imagine the questions your interviewer will ask. Know that you have a story to tell that will open hearts and minds.