Why Not Keep Trying Something New?
After a pretty “heavy” post yesterday about some of the difficult feelings many of us can relate to, thought I’d balance it out with a more productive message today.
The FIRST place my psychologist sent me (once I was fortunate enough to find her) to begin my healing process, was to a weekend class, learning to breathe in a healing & restorative way.
Having tried 50+ drug combos, 23 TMS treatments & 12 shock therapy treatments, I was finally willing to “try something new” – outside of “traditional” treatments.
I get into this wknd class & I’m the only male, only one under 40, only one born in the US. I couldn’t have felt further out of place. However, this experience of learning to breathe properly is what I credit with removing me from the hell period I’d been in the previous 2.5 years. Yes it took me to a point where there were a lack of “other options,” to finally try something “new” beyond swallow & pray for the magic pill or machine to work, but ultimately I got – out of the box.
For those who have followed the blog over the past year, you know that the learnings I took from the “alternative” breathing practices, I’ve used elsewhere. Sometimes I ‘m the only 6’-4” male well over 200 lbs in a Yin Yoga class. Other times I’ve been the only American at a Qigong Meditation course in Indonesia. Recently I’ve been doing an online course in overcoming “Emotional Flatlining” – something that may not be easy for those who want to come across as “tough/strong” would admit to.
Here’s the common denominator tho: whether what I have is considered the formal: “treatment resistant” or the more informal: “strangely F-d up in a way others aren’t,” I’ve learned that the only way to heal is to try different things & see which work for you.
I’m a work in progress. I’m always going to be a work in progress. I don’t feel how I WANT to feel right now. But, I’m always going to keep working at it, no matter how strange or different or weird the modality may seem.
When it comes to our weight (losing or gaining) we are always willing to try something new – a workout or a food plan, to feel better. Why is it not the same with our MH? Most of us don’t wait until we are morbidly obese, or extremely frail/thin to make changes to our diet or exercise program. That’s exactly what I did with my brain – waited till it was “obese” to try something new.
Learn from my mistakes. We put TSRR practices on weareallalittlecrazy.org so you can see your options. We didn’t call them eastern, holistic, functional, or alternative bc we know those words tune ppl out. But TSRR: Trauma & Stress Release & Rewiring should give you confidence that these practices are based in science. If you don’t like the way you are feeling emotionally, don’t keep doing the SAME thing, or worse, the same NOTHING!!!
I promise you, wherever you are at on the continuum, you can feel better – but you have to be willing to try new things & you have to be willing to work for it.
