Fertilizer for your mind. It may be unpleasant, but it will help you grow.

This blog is not a substitute for therapy.

Growing From Believing In Yourself

By Janet Shiver, LCSW, MPH

February 4, 2020

Even though I grew up in Los Angeles, I have never been the biggest basketball fan. I don’t mean this in poor taste, especially given the tragic news of Kobe Bryant’s passing on January 26, 2020.

Sure, the Lakers were always a part of my life in one way or another. My father, my uncles, my brother, and my husband all love the Lakers. Kobe, especially, is a Los Angeles icon . Although I didn’t follow his career like his diehard fans, I remember countless Laker Day parades. More vividly, I remember one bartender hopping up and dancing on the bar top when the Lakers won one of their many championships. Kobe lit up a whole city. He gave selflessly to Los Angeles and instilled Angeleno pride in all of us.I always knew and respected him for what he was: a legend. He will always be the G.O.A.T.*

His sudden loss brings up so many feelings and thoughts. Many people feel empty, hollow, numb, shock, anger, despair, and disappointment. There’s an emergent need to second guess our direction in life when tragedies like this occur; we place our goals and our purpose under a microscope for closer self-examination. If you’ve questioned what you are doing with your life in the past week, then you have been taking this opportunity to reflect upon your own purpose, the sometimes inevitable gift of loss.

While loss can sometimes give us clarity about our goals, self-doubt can quickly chip away at it. Many of us have goals and dreams we would like to achieve, but we’ve become too paralyzed with self-doubt to make a move. Our dreams have become stacked upon each other in our mind’s garage like old forgotten boxes. What have you been meaning to start, to do, to continue, to accomplish, but have talked yourself out of? What would you do or change in your life if you believed you could not fail? Would you leave that relationship for the happiness you deserve? Would you quit that job, start that business? Would you advocate for that position, that promotion? Would you put yourself out there? Would you believe you deserve to win?

Self doubt can be a kryptonite for self-esteem. Self esteem is our own subjective assessment of our self worth. Self-esteem can be shaped by many aspects of our life, including our upbringing, our relationships with others, society, media, systemic oppression, etc. Self-esteem can also be shaped by negative core beliefs.

Negative core beliefs are deep-rooted perceptions we develop over time about our self, others, and the world. A lot of negative core beliefs start in childhood and have to do with our experiences as children; these experiences then teach us what to expect from ourselves and others as we grow older. Many people have negative core beliefs about themselves, such as,”I’m not good enough,” or “I’m worthless,” or “I am a failure.” Negative core beliefs are so deeply rooted that people tend to invest in them as if they were truths. A lot of times, negative core beliefs develop into self-fulfilling prophecies; we feel so badly about ourselves and our potential that we talk ourselves out of going after our dreams, thus creating a false narrative that we aren’t capable of making these dreams a reality.

So how do we work towards challenging negative core beliefs and ultimately, self-doubt. For one, understanding what your negative core beliefs are as well as where they come from is important. It can help to make an outline of unhealthy patterns and relationships in your life to get a better understanding of where they originate and what these negative core beliefs are. Journaling as well as individual therapy can also help you gain more clarity and understanding about these negative core beliefs.

Once you have more insight, challenging and reframing these negative core beliefs is essential. For example, if the negative core belief is,”I’m not good enough,” ask yourself what’s the evidence that this is true and what’s the evidence that this is not true. A lot of times, there is no evidence. So how can we reframe this? “I’m doing the best I can,” is a neutral response to “I’m not good enough.” We may not always believe these reframes at first. It takes practice and it is work. There are many cognitive behavioral techniques you can learn in therapy and also in literature to help you work on challenging negative core beliefs and ultimately strengthening your self-esteem. If you are ready to do the work, the help is out there.

Social support is just as important as the work we do on our internal narrative. Are you surrounding yourself around people who support you and your dreams? Do they motivate you? Do they believe in you? Do they challenge you to be your best self? By answering these questions, you can gain helpful insight about your support system and their possible influence on your self-esteem and belief in yourself.

There are many ways to approach self-esteem work. This post is just the tip of the iceberg and a starting point to start examining your own self-esteem issues. But it’s important to remember that it is a process and will take time. Kobe wasn’t always confident. He too had to build his self esteem and challenge his own negative core beliefs. He pushed himself because he believed in himself. You have the potential. Ask for what you want. Leave that unhealthy relationship. Quit that job. Build that business. Build the life you deserve. Believe in yourself. You have the power to get in the game, to slam dunk your dreams like Kobe— no more waiting on the sidelines.

*Greatest Of All Time

Growing From A Difficult Year

By Janet Shiver, LCSW, MPH

December 31, 2019

It’s that time again, folks. Time to grab the sparkling cider—or something a little stronger, if you get down like that—and count down to all of your hopes, joys, and ambitions into a new year. In this case, a new decade. It’s time to make resolutions you may or may not keep. It’s time to shirk off the old, embrace the new, and water dreams. However, if you find yourself still sitting with the hurt, anger, disappointment, uncertainty, and overall crappiness—new official clinical term—of this past year, counting down to 1 with enthusiasm might be difficult.

Maybe this year was one of the worst for you. Maybe there was loss, heartbreak, disappointment, ruptured relationships, increase in mental health symptoms, disheartening realizations, uncertain steps, a crisis of faith, or major professional or personal setbacks. Whatever it was, it sucked. You’ve probably experienced a flood of emotions—anger, loneliness, hurt, depression, anxiety, overwhelm, bitterness, disappointment. It can be daunting to take these feelings into the New Year. So what do we do with these feelings? How do we grow from these experiences?

We can start by acknowledging and processing how painful this year was for you. This includes acknowledging all the difficult emotions you experienced. Journaling and/or creating a timeline of what happened, what went wrong, turning points, and how you felt can concretize this for you. This is multi-purpose because it is not only an emotional and mental release, but it honors the journey you have been on. As you acknowledge these feelings and this journey, be kind to yourself. Imagine a friend was sharing the details of this same journey with you. How would you talk to them about it? Would you be kind? Then give that same kindness to yourself. To further process this journey and the feelings attached, talking to loved ones about it can be helpful, but as your loved ones do have their limitations, starting or continuing therapy can be a great source of support in surveying the wreckage of the past as you move forward into the future.

Through making a timeline, journaling, practicing self-compassion, and processing the experience with loved ones and a therapist, you can begin to take steps to reframe the narrative. This can take a lot of digging deep when you are coming from a place of despair. But, when we truly magnify the hurt from not getting that promotion or having our partner leave us, even in that despair, there is opportunity for neutral or positive reframe. Let’s take the first example. You didn’t get the promotion but aside from an increase in pay, it could have been an increase in the workload. Which means less time for the things that are important to you—family, friends, self-care. And if this isn’t the first time you’ve gotten passed up despite all of the hard work you put in at your place of employment, this is more information that this may not be the place where you can grow. Or that it’s time to speak up. Similarly, in the second example, we can normalize the grief of heartache while aIso reframing the disappointment, despair, and heartache into gratitude, insight, and growth. Maybe your partner was emotionally unavailable. Maybe the relationship wasn’t the healthiest. Or maybe it was a great relationship that taught you many lessons that you can now use in the next relationship. Maybe the relationship freed you; the heartache may have rescued you after all. Recognize, though, that not all major losses, life changes, and disappointments can be reframed so easily. Some pain points will take much longer to heal.

Whatever the reframe, though, take what you need from the pain and hurt of this year to help you grow. It’s all fertilizer, after all. So ask yourself what you learned, what worked, what didn’t, what needs to change, and how you would like to make those changes in the New Year. Leave behind the self-criticism, doubts, and tests of this year and choose the lessons.

And remember, you do not have to go it alone. Utilize your supports. Your friends and family want to be there for you, if you give them the opportunity to do so. Just as important as your supports is your self-care. It can be hard to do the things that bring you joy when you have been through a difficult year, but try and do these things anyway. The more we practice self-care, the better we feel, despite our challenges. Even more so, practicing self-care sends a message to us and to the adversity we faced this year that we are resilient and deserve to thrive.

Positive psychology, created by Martin Seligman, focuses on thriving, as it looks at the strengths and behaviors humans utilize to build a meaningful and fulfilling life. Gratitude is a part of this. There is always something to be grateful for. You made it through a difficult year. You survived that job. You survived your family issues. You survived your relationship issues. You survived that loss. You survived that transition. Give yourself permission to go into this New Year with gratitude, cautious optimism, resiliency, and strength. Give yourself permission this new year to grow from surviving to thriving. 2020 is more than a year—it’s a time to see things with better vision than the year before. So l’chaim, proost, santé, salud, cheers to a New Year and a better, stronger, happier you.

Growing From Setting Boundaries

By Janet Shiver, LCSW, MPH

September 18, 2019

We’ve all heard it before. And if we haven’t yet, we need to now. We teach people how to treat us. Whether it’s at home, at work, or with loved ones, when we allow others to mistreat us, dominate us, discount us, or cha-cha-cha slide all over our boundaries, we inevitably teach them that we are okay with it. We teach them that their needs matter more than our own. We in turn silence our own voice and tolerate these unbalanced relationships.

Learning how to set boundaries with others can be a helpful tool for establishing more healthy, balanced relationships. So what are boundaries? Boundaries are limits that we set with others, and sometimes even ourselves, to protect our time, energy, emotional and physical space, and overall needs. Boundaries are taught to us as early as childhood. We learn from our families what boundaries to have and not have. Culture also has a huge influence on how we view and implement boundaries. This is why and also how so many people develop different relationships with boundaries.

Some families have porous or enmeshed boundaries—over-involvement in each other’s lives to the point that everything must be shared and out in the open. The idea of privacy or setting limits can be really foreign and a lot of times, the family dynamics are so enmeshed that it can feel like one is doing something wrong by even attempting to set boundaries. Individuation, coined by Carl Jung, is the process by which we develop our own unique self-identity as human beings. Individuation can be very hard in enmeshed families because of co-dependency and the expectation to always think of the family’s needs as opposed to one’s own needs. Just the opposite, families with rigid boundaries can be isolated, closed off, and disconnected from each other. Emotional expression and communication can be difficult, so one can imagine that fostering an openness and receptivity in these families can be a feat.

The middle ground, which can still be very difficult for some, would be learning how to set healthy boundaries. Healthy boundaries allow us to set limits with others in a way where we can maintain positive self-esteem and can be true to our own needs and wants without fear of experiencing negative consequences, such as rejection, anger, or manipulation, in our relationships. Developing healthy boundaries is not always easy when we come from families that are enmeshed or rigid, and if not truly acknowledged and addressed, can easily transform into boundary issues in our adult relationships.

As an attachment-oriented therapist, I infuse so much of this theory into my practice, so it’s imperative to point out that our attachment styles also influence our comfortability and ability to set limits in relationships. Attachment theory, which was founded by John Bowlby, teaches us that the attachment we have to our parents growing up bears semblance to the attachment we will experience with others as adults. For example, if we have parents who practice healthy boundaries, give us space, are reliable, and attuned to our needs, we develop a secure attachment style. We go out in the world with the belief that we can and will form secure attachments with others, and that others can meet and be attuned with our needs. However, if we have parents who are not attuned to our needs and who have rigid boundaries, we might be more avoidant in intimate relationships, developing a mindset that others truly cannot meet our needs and it is not safe to show vulnerability. Anxious attachment style is also what can happen when someone grows up in a household where his or her needs are inconsistently met, and so he or she develops a mindset that others will never truly fulfill his or her needs and constantly feels ambivalent about the security and fulfillment that can be achieved in relationships.

If we grow up with an avoidant attachment style, we may struggle with rigid boundaries and not know how to let others in, which can be very isolating. If we grow up with an anxious attachment style, we may have inconsistent boundaries because of our own fear of not getting our needs met. But if we have more corrective experiences in our adult relationships, experiences which test and challenge our fears and expectations in relationships and generate different outcomes than we’ve come to know, we can begin working on establishing both secure attachments and healthier boundaries.

So how do we set boundaries? Self-awareness is always a natural step. Ask yourself if you have healthy boundaries with others. Do you feel respected, heard, and validated in these relationships? If the answer is no, then why not? Journaling or talking to a therapist may give you more insight on your boundary issues, whether they stem from childhood or are due to a new situation or relationship. Once we have more insight about our boundary issues, we will better be able to identify what our needs and wants are in the relationship. So ask yourself, what are you needing in this relationship with this person? What are you comfortable with? What are you uncomfortable with? What would you like to see change? What boundaries would you like to set? How would you like to set them? Getting clarity around these questions can help you decide the next steps. For some, it involves practicing assertive communication, or the act of honestly and confidently expressing one’s wants or needs in a way that still respects the other person’s own wants and needs. This can come in the form of more dissenting opinions or ideas, saying no, and verbalizing the need for change. For others, it can be a change in behavior itself, such as distancing one’s self from the person or avoiding falling into the same patterns, experiences, or conversations that test these boundaries.

But don’t be disillusioned. This is a hard thing to do, especially depending on your relationship and experience with boundaries, attachment style, and communication style. It can take years of therapy and practice to feel comfortable setting limits with your mother or your sister. It can take quite a while to set limits at work and stop taking on so much. It can be difficult to verbalize your needs to your significant other. But it’s all worth it. Boundaries are most powerful when they are reinforced. It takes not only practice, but also self-compassion. It takes sitting with natural, but sometimes painful, emotions. Often times, when people set boundaries, they feel “selfish” or “wrong.” This is because when we start to set boundaries, we can sometimes experience pushback from others who are not used to us speaking up or behaving in a way that truly honors us. In some cases, we may even feel rejected or punished for setting healthy limits, especially in families with porous boundaries. This doesn’t mean we have to stop setting these boundaries or are doing anything wrong. On the contrary, we are starting to do something very right—we are starting to create space for healthier relationships with others. So remember, say yes if you can and want to. No is a complete sentence. You have the right to your personal, emotional, and physical space. Your needs and wants do matter. You have a voice and life—your life—is meant to be lived out loud.

Growing From Grief

By Janet Shiver, LCSW, MPH

August 12, 2019

In Loving Memory of Author, Toni Morrison February 18, 1931- August 5, 2019

My first experience of grief and loss was when I was in middle school and one of my favorite uncles died suddenly of a heart attack. I remember, it was raining so heavily that day and I came home to hear the awful news to the beat of a torrential downpour. It was horrible. To this day, when it rains heavily, my psyche cannot help but make a connection to loss.

One of the hardest parts about death is that it can appear and feel so final. Death changes everything, including how we see ourselves and others, how we choose to live our lives, and how we see the future. It can be hard to live the same day to day life as you once did knowing your loved one is no longer physically present. We too have now been changed. If there were unresolved issues before the loss, these issues are not just buried with the deceased. These issues become embedded within the loss. All the things we never said, or should have, or did say or did that we now regret. They fold into the loss, envelope it. The resolutions that never happened. The understanding that never materialized. Death can be final in the sense that the loved one will never come back in the flesh, but for many people, it can be an ongoing process that morphs through the stages of grief, and for some, even into self-transcendence.

The stages of grief, created by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, are denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. They are not meant to be gone through in chronological order; you don’t go through each stage, check them off, and then you are done grieving.  Many people start out feeling shocked and in denial about the loss, picking up the phone to call the loved one or waiting for a text. It can be hard when we just saw the person a few days ago, alive and well. The loved one was just here. Some people like to imagine that the loved one is away on a trip and will be back at some point. How we experience the rest of the stages really depends on the person, and how deeply the stage is felt is also very personal. Some people may stay angry for a long while, whether it’s at the loss itself and the meaning now attached, at the person for leaving them, at the unresolved issues in the relationship, etc. Others bargain with themselves, or sometimes a Higher Power, about things they will do differently or ways they could have intervened or even saved the person. Depression is also a stage many people stay in for a while. In a lot of ways, it can be the face of grief. If depression gets to the point of suicidal thoughts, always seek immediate help from a therapist, psychiatrist, and/or the nearest emergency room. Acceptance can be one of the most difficult. It doesn’t mean liking the situation or even understanding it completely, but it can translate into acknowledgement that this horrible life event has happened and changes have taken place. It is acceptance of a new way of life in which we can honor the loss while still taking steps to live our own lives.

So how do we grow from grief? For starters, let’s banish the notion that there is any right or wrong way to grieve. You grieve the way you grieve. For some, that means being expressive, whether it’s releasing tears, journaling, or talking about the loved one to others. For others, especially those who internalize, it might be processing the grief privately, behind closed doors. Still, for others, culture plays a lot into how we grieve and what is expected of us in our community. There are so many fibers to the fabric of grief. Whatever way you grieve, there’s a lot to be said about giving yourself space and time to do so. That also means recognizing that there is no time frame for grief. Grief lasts. With time, we adapt, we adjust, we continue to live our lives with grief as the backdrop. It is not something we just get over. Some people rush to move on, so as not to feel the pain, hiding themselves in their work or other time-consuming efforts, only to find grief waiting for them in obvious or inconspicuous ways in their lives. Give yourself the time.

Self-care and social support is also key in growing from grief. Daily self-care includes eating, showering, making sure you have food in the fridge, journaling, leaving the house for at least 20 min a day, returning that phone call, checking your e-mail for at least 10 min, taking time off of work—all the things that we can find difficult to do when we are grieving. These things can be hard to do it alone, which is why you don’t have to. Reaching out to your supports is paramount. They want to be there for you, so let them, even if you don’t know what you need and even if they don’t know exactly how to help. If your immediate support circle is too hard, consider attending a grief group at least a year after the loss, for additional support, or seeking the support from safe, online grief support resources. Therapy is also a safe and meaningful place for you to unpack grief.

There is an African proverb that goes, “Death is not for one person,” meaning it is a deeply shared experience. It transcends the deceased and permeates the lives of those left behind who loved him or her. We can grow from grief through self-transcendence. Self-transcendance goes beyond the stage of acceptance. It is the experience in which you can extend your perspective beyond the loss and achieve a sense of purpose from the loss by initiating and participating in meaningful activities (ie starting a memorial fund or scholarship stemming from the loss, advocating for new laws, creating a mission from the loss, starting a new program related to the loss, etc). From the loss, new seeds are planted. Growth is to be seen.

There are so many sides of loss. This blog post is just the tip of the iceberg. Whether it is the loss of a loved one, a dream, a sense of self you had to let go, a pet—take care of yourself. Remember the good. Hold on to the memories. As long as you have breath in your body, you keep the ones you have loved alive. So breathe.

Growing from Stuckness

By Janet Shiver, LCSW, MPH

Wednesday, July 24, 2019

When I was little, my favorite cartoons for some odd reason involved the characters getting stuck in tar or sinking into a mouth of quicksand. It’s not to say that I enjoyed watching them struggle, because that would actually be quite disturbing for a 7 year old to take pleasure in that. The truth is, I liked watching them be rescued last minute by another character. My favorite part, though, was when they rescued themselves. Those cartoons prepared me for what I know is true today: “stuckness” is a thing but so is planning and executing your own rescue.

Stuckness is pervasive. It’s heavy. It is a weighted blanket that sinks us into a bed of denial. Some of us sleep in it. Some of us live our nightmares in it. We tell ourselves we are trapped. This is life now. Things aren’t going to change. Get up, go to work, don’t feel, nothing’s going to be different, we are out of options, and hopelessness is the new normal. You know the mantra. Stuckness is the daughter of learned helplessness. Learned helplessness is when we have enough crap happen to us beyond our perceived control in our upbringing, at school, at work, and in our relationships that we start to feel powerless, so powerless that we give up on fighting to change things for the better. We give up and we give birth to stuckness. We stay in that job. We stay in that relationship. We stay. And we stay. And we stay. And we’re miserable.

So how do we get unstuck? Before we tap into that, a more fruitful question might be how and why we got stuck in the first place. There are many factors to why we get stuck in life, whether it’s in a relationship, in our career, or other areas. I am very attachment-theory oriented in my work, so I usually start with childhood. What did you learn about getting your needs met from your parents? Were you told and shown that getting your needs met is possible? How were you shown the world would treat you? What were some negative core beliefs, or deep rooted ideas about yourself, you learned and what did you learn about your ability to make changes for yourself? As an adult now, why did you choose this person, career, or goal? What were your needs initially when you pursued any of these things? What are your needs now? Could it be that your needs are different but you either haven’t realized it yet or are too scared to admit it? And what are your feelings about change? Sometimes we stay in dysfunctional, toxic “situationships” and careers because they are familiar, not because they are healthy. We become invested in being stuck because then we don’t have to confront our fears. We stay because of fear of change or fear of failure. All of these questions and considerations can be fruitful in helping you get to the root of how you got here. It can be painful to face, but liberating all the same. Remember, choosing not to make a choice is still a choice, and it’s one that can often imprison you.

When we give ourselves options, we liberate ourselves. We empower ourselves. We become real with ourselves, our wants, and our needs. We liberate ourselves from what we hoped the toxic relationship or job would be and see it for what it really is, as well as how it affects our mood, functioning, and self-esteem. We can gain clarity that our needs have changed or may never have been met. We challenge the negative core belief that we will fail if we make changes. We realize that we deserve more and can be more. The blinders come off.

Options are key because they strengthen our self-efficacy, or the belief that we can truly achieve our goals. When we start going to therapy, updating our resume, applying for jobs, distancing ourselves from or ending unhealthy relationships, practicing more daily self-care, and utilizing more positive supports, we are giving ourselves options and building a sense of self-efficacy. We are telling and showing ourselves that there is another way and we can do something different. So start asking yourself the hard questions about how and why you got here. Start writing down and ranking your options. Start challenging negative core beliefs that you can’t do this thing. Because you can. Take the next step. You’ve got this. You are your own rescuer.