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Habits

3/9/2017

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Habits are hard to break.  Especially the ones that harm us.

Then why do we smoke, drink, gamble, steal, lie, cheat, use words as weapons, or indulge in other high risk behaviors that hurt others and/or ourselves?  Is it the illusion of comfort, connection, or immunity to chaos?

As a physician, parent, partner, meditation/writing teacher, and friend, it is a privilege to guide others through subconscious forests.  Which paths will offer insight and lead to meaningful healing?  When the path is narrow, am I leading them or are they guiding me?  What would it mean to walk side by side when the path widens again?

Sometimes I’ll use a motivational interviewing technique and ask their willingness to change a behavior on a scale of 1 to 10.  I’ll also use the same ruler to gauge their confidence in making this change, discussing why the number is high or low in each circumstance.  We’ll explore the reasons why they want to make the change and the barriers in their way.

For fun (and maybe to cultivate more humility), I decided to apply this technique to a behavior I wanted to change: cutting down on sugar and caffeine.  On a motivation scale, I was at a 9.  My reasons for cutting down on both were to experience less anxiety, heartburn, and inflammation, feel better, and have more energy directed towards the people and things I care about.  On a confidence scale I was closer to a 7 and less certain.  Barriers to implementing this change included family members loving sweets (having sweets in the house), enjoying the taste of certain desserts (especially chocolate and coffee), and using sweets as stress relievers.

The motivational interviewing readiness ruler is quite useful in examining habits, but something crucial is missing.  The evaluation feels a little too cerebral, as if I’m guiding others and myself with a GPS unit that only knows one way.  What if we get lost on the hike and the trails are unmarked?  What can we count on to direct us?

In my blog posts, you’ll notice I keep coming back to the heart.  Perhaps the most important question is not how motivated or confident we are in changing a habit, or even what the barriers are.  What if the most important question is, “What is the need beneath the want”?  What is the need beneath smoking, drinking, gambling, stealing, lying, cheating, aggression, and high risk sexual behaviors?  Do we even stop long enough to ask each other this question?

Maybe the deeper need is for safety, kindness, connection, understanding, or peace.  Maybe it’s a little bit of each one.  As I ask this question, I sense my true need for sweets is a yearning for the sweetness life offers through authentic connections with others and myself.  But I can’t know this need without feeling the pain of separation first.
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Certain habits feel good, but they disconnect us from our deepest longing.  Our fear of falling into the abyss of that longing hardens our habits.  If you are earnestly trying to change a harmful behavior affecting you or someone you love, may this post inspire you to ask tough questions.  May you sense the need beneath the want and have the support to explore your wild heart with an affirming companion.
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The Heart of the Forest by BurnerPat
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13th Annual Mother's Symposium with Anne Lamott

3/4/2017

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Today I had the privilege of attending the 13th annual Mother’s Symposium at Stanford with guest speaker, author, mother, and grandmother Anne Lamott.  She shared so many beautiful pearls.  Where do I even begin?  Let me start here. 

Our culture sends a subliminal message of perfection, especially in the Silicon Valley.  Being sensitive, being different is simply not OK.  Our culture doesn’t tell us how hard it really is.  But Anne, recovering from alcohol addiction, bulimia, obsessive-compulsive disorder and anxiety says that transparency heals.  “If you can hang on and have two great trippy friends along the way, you will stay alive.  The way you are is the best possible way to be.  To wear a suit of armor is so much harder.”

Anne’s advice to mothers is that we all blow it.  We all screw up.  We all damage our children.  And we start over.  When we share our stories of vulnerability, we often exclaim, “Me, too!” in the process of discovery.  We’re scared to death that that we’ll lose our children, but we wouldn’t offer them anything we wouldn’t give ourselves.  All we need to do is ask them, “Do you need to eat or talk, cry or scream?”

In Palo Alto, an idyllic town tucked in between Stanford University and suburbia, green foothills and the Pacific coast, teen suicides have given cozy parents something more to think about than higher education, escalating back accounts or exotic vacations.  How can we ask our teens to be less than 10% scary so we can understand them?  How can we remind them each day that they are chosen for a higher purpose that we cannot know, that they are deeply loved?

Recounting her own parenting journey in raising her son, Sam, Anne shares a helpful acronym called W.A.I.T.  As parents, we often try to control our teens, especially on taboo topics such as sexuality, psychological health, and their future (what they should be doing now to prepare for their future).  Julianne Harvey said, “Help is the sunny side of control”.  Before we communicate with them, can we listen deeply?  Can we sense where we are trying to fix or change them for a certain outcome?  Can we ask ourselves to WAIT (why am I talking or texting) before speaking?

​For writers, Anne offers the following advice.  "Learn to love the eraser.  Listen better."  She draws a parallel between writing and parenting.  Learn to make mistakes.  After listening, rewrite the script, over and over again.

We are so hungry for something that is already here, something we already have.  Maybe our teens are also hungry for something that’s already here, something they already have.  When we stop, share stories, and listen, the armoring falls away.  What’s left is hope, not that This or That will happen, but that we will be surrounded by our closest friends no matter what.  Look how communities bond after natural disasters and the miracles that follow acts of kindness.  We don’t know certain things, but what we do know saves us.  The breath connects us umbilically to the universe, a higher power some call God or the Great Mystery.

The symposium is punctuated by Anne’s take on the invisible work of parenting.  For her, the invisible work is working on ourselves, noticing when we are trying to control things, what we might need before we can speak and act in ways that feel safe, warm, and inviting for our children.  What we expect of our children may have nothing to do with who they are.  Our own inner work is necessary to know them.
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(The reflections above are based on my notes from the symposium.  If I have misquoted Anne or misunderstood any of her ideas, I offer my sincere apologies.)

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    Kaveri Patel, a woman who is always searching for the wisdom in waves.

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