Jenna Zaffino:
Hi, everyone. I'm Jenna. In this session, I thought we'd come together and have a little chat about the days that just aren't going your way. I am a person who lives with multiple autoimmune conditions, and I'm no stranger to the chaos that can come upon your body unexpectedly, your life, work, and all of it. But I do know that it helps to have a few strategies that can kind of interrupt what's happening and remind you that you are a whole person at the center of the chaos and that you are not necessarily the chaos itself. For me, this helps me just get perspective and make better, more informed choices about the way I'm moving through my day. Maybe it's the way I'm caring for myself or the way I'm expressing the need for care to others. It's something I do for myself as opposed to allowing myself to get swept up in the chaos, which I know from personal experience does not work so well.
So I'd like to share a couple of tools that I use, and the first is becoming an observer. So there are 2 things that I do in this case. When things are out of control, when I feel the tension enter my body, when I feel my heart rate quicken, when I start to notice my thoughts racing, when fear has entered the chat, I think about a strategy called 3rd party perspective. And that is where I imagine myself standing 10 feet away and simply observing what's happening in the moment. Often doing this, I can better notice maybe my shoulders are up, or my fists are clenched or my thoughts are wild. And I can sometimes help myself temper and release some of the tension that just isn't helping in that moment. So the trick is to imagine yourself standing 10 feet across the room, and then just notice what you see. It might feel impossible, but I encourage you to try it.
And you might notice, oh, I'm clenching my jaw, or I'm sitting way forward, or I've got much tension around my neck and shoulders. I need to take a breath. I'm not breathing. Some of these simple insights can help you feel more grounded in the midst of a chaotic event. Also, with observing comes kind of a nonjudgmental commentary. I am a fan of humor. I learned this one from a comedian called Pete Holmes, where in the midst of a chaotic day, he might look at the situation at hand and say, great episode, as if he's watching an episode of his life on a sitcom television show. And while this may feel a little trite or like you're tossing aside something super serious, it is a way to diffuse some of the tension surrounding a chaotic experience.
Like, alright. Great episode. I wonder what will happen next week. It's a way of distancing yourself from the chaos itself and can sometimes help you, again, gain perspective and just some focus on what are the next steps that would be the most helpful for you. So observing, noting without judgment, bringing a little humor into the situation, if that works for you. Those can be really useful techniques initially. The second piece that I like to use is what I call a stress scene investigator. You may have heard me talk about this in other videos or in any workshops you've taken with me.
It's about being a detective surrounding your experience and essentially gathering information to see what are the facts and what are the stories that I might be telling about the facts. Again, this is not to undermine your own experience, but instead, it's to just gain some real hard and focused truths about what's actually happening outside of the emotional reaction that you're having. You and I will have emotional reactions. But when we feel like those reactions are overwhelming, it can be helpful to say, okay. Let me take a step back. Let me get out my Sherlock Holmes magnifying glass and just look around and see what's actually going on, and name it for what it is. When you have perspective about the chaos, there's often more options that you can use to help yourself out amidst the chaos. And sometimes, it's just taking a step back.
The last piece surrounds exploring your needs in consideration to the chaos. Thinking about what might be helpful for you as you are in this state of chaos, of stress. Sometimes that's going to be something you can give yourself, whether it's a calming exercise, space, time, a stress scene investigator situation, writing some things down, or whether it's the ability to express what you need to another person. It can be really hard to adequately express what you need to somebody else when you're in the middle of this the chaos. I had a great friend years ago while I was navigating through a difficult diagnosis, And she said to me, what would be most helpful for you right now? And I had never been asked that question before. I had been asked, what do you need me to do? What can I do? What can I do? Lots of those kind of questions, but no one had asked me what would be helpful. And it changed my perception of that question so much so that I was able to list out very specific needs that I couldn't do when I was answering the question of what do you need me to do. So if you are able to think about what would be helpful for me in this moment, that often will help you help yourself, and it will also help you adequately express your needs to someone else.
So the strategy is after, possibly, you're feeling the chaos. You name and distance yourself from it for a moment to remind yourself that you are not the chaos, but you are a part of it, but it is not you. You move into investigating what is actually happening versus what you think is happening. And then finally, you think about what might be helpful and think about how you can communicate that to another person. Now all of these steps truly require you to adopt the role of self advocate. And when you're feeling chaotic or you're lacking energy, that can be so, so challenging. So, again, the expectation is not perfection in these exercises. Instead, it's the ability to be willing to show up and try some of these things out, the courage to do it even when it feels awkward or foreign to you, and the curiosity to see what might happen on the other side.
These three aspects, willingness, courage, and curiosity, they better equipped you to be in the driver's seat of those chaotic moments in your life. And I can say from firsthand experience, when you are in the driver's seat, you are so much better resourced to move outside of the chaos at an easier pace and to a place where you're better able to manage the things you need to take care of. So I hope this was helpful for you. I'll encourage you to, again, use the tips that work for you and leave the rest to another time. Remember, you are strong, resilient, and these small moments matter. I'll see you in a session real soon.
