Melody McDowell, LCSW #77565

I LOVE this. So important and empowering for kids (and adults) to learn to distinguish- and practice - these differences! Role playing scenarios or exploring how passive/assertive/responses would sound and feel to say (with you offering possible responses from the imaginary other people in the scenario) can be a powerful teaching tool!

What trauma response(s) shows up in your life and business?

Need this reminder every day. Via Spilt Milk

Don't miss episode 4 of the Making Peace podcast. This one is all about boundaries... http://makingpeace.buzzsprout.com

"The Rise" by Dr. Sarah Lewis is one of my favorite books! In this episode of the #DaretoLead Podcast, Dr. Lewis and I talk why the word failure doesn’t quit...e capture the often transformative experience of falling and beginning again, the difference between success and mastery, and the power of setting audacious goals that are right outside our grasp. The conversation was so moving for me that we're doing Part II after the New Year! You can listen here: https://bit.ly/3q9ioYu

Self-care is often a very unbeautiful thing. It is making a spreadsheet of your debt and enforcing a morning routine and cooking yourself healthy meals and no ...longer just running from your problems and calling the distraction a solution. It is often doing the ugliest thing that you have to do, like sweat through another workout or tell a toxic friend you don’t want to see them anymore or get a second job so you can have a savings account or figure out a way to accept yourself so that you’re not constantly exhausted from trying to be everything, all the time and then needing to take deliberate, mandated breaks from living to do basic things like drop some oil into a bath and read Marie Claire and turn your phone off for the day. A world in which self-care has to be such a trendy topic is a world that is sick. Self-care should not be something we resort to because we are so absolutely exhausted that we need some reprieve from our own relentless internal pressure. True self-care is not salt baths and chocolate cake, it is making the choice to build a life you don’t need to regularly escape from. And that often takes doing the thing you least want to do. It often means looking your failures and disappointments square in the eye and re-strategizing. It is not satiating your immediate desires. It is letting go. It is choosing new. It is disappointing some people. It is making sacrifices for others. It is living a way that other people won’t, so maybe you can live in a way that other people can’t. It is letting yourself be normal. Regular. Unexceptional. It is sometimes having a dirty kitchen and deciding your ultimate goal in life isn’t going to be having abs and keeping up with your fake friends. It is deciding how much of your anxiety comes from not actualizing your latent potential, and how much comes from the way you were being trained to think before you even knew what was happening. If you find yourself having to regularly indulge in consumer self-care, it’s because you are disconnected from actual self-care, which has very little to do with treating yourself and a whole lot do with parenting yourself and making choices for your long-term wellness. It is no longer using your hectic and unreasonable life as justification for self-sabotage in the form of liquor and procrastination. It is learning how to stop trying to fix yourself and start trying to take care of yourself and maybe finding that taking care lovingly attends to a lot of the problems you were trying to fix in the first place. It means being the hero of your life, not the victim. It means rewiring what you have until your everyday life isn’t something you need therapy to recover from. It is no longer choosing a life that looks good over a life that feels good. It is giving the hell up on some goals so you can care about others. It is being honest even if that means you aren’t universally liked. It is meeting your own needs so you aren’t anxious and dependent on other people. It is becoming the person you know you want and are meant to be. Someone who knows that salt baths and chocolate cake are ways to enjoy life not escape from it. -Brianna Wiest [Illustration: Yaoyao Ma]

I introduce this episode with a few thoughts on the importance of giving yourself grace and picking yourself back up when you feel you might be failing. The focus of this episode is on becoming more self-aware of your emotional experience and learning to regulate it so that you are equipped to acknowledge, face, and manage it for yourself before it becomes an obstacle to resolving a relationship issue. Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts Making Peace: A Therapy Podcast... Navigating Love, Conflict, and Relationships https://www.buzzsprout.com/1445980/6454087

Can you relate?

And we're live! The first mini-episode has been aired and is available on Spotify and at makingpeace.buzzsprout.com You can expect it to be available on Apple and Google podcast libraries in the next few days!

The importance of smaller steps. Love it

This beautiful verse was written by Laura Ding-Edwards and you can find her work at Rainbird Roots Do pop over for more inspiring verse. Isn't it ...beautiful. She has a gift with words. You can purchase your own card here :) https://www.facebook.com//a.64596005886/2005264592930392/ See more

This is not the full comic, some panels are missing, but this is fantastic in showing what it can be like. Artist credit: Colleen Butters. Original source: https://solar-citrus.tumblr.com//you-would-be-surprise/amp

I have some exciting news! This month I will be launching my podcast, Making Peace. This has been a growing dream/wish/hope for several months and I am thrilled that it is happening. You can expect episodes on love, navigating conflict, setting boundaries, assertiveness, and many other related mental health topics. If you’re as excited about this as I am, please Like and leave a comment about what you would appreciate hearing!

Help us spread the word to fire survivors!

For a free daily strategy to help you overcome depression https://thedepressionproject.com/daily-strategies

For caregivers of young ones with mental illness - this looks to be a great resource!

We may not be able to meet face-to-face, but this free virtual seminar will be a terrific help to many people suffering from anxious thoughts and feelings. Please share!