Ayame,

First of all, thank you for being a teacher. None of us are perfect, and even someone with a racing mind can shine light into the hearts and minds of children. If that fantasy “someone” shows up saying you shouldn’t teach, feel free to give them a kick in the whooha. Or a hug, god knows the world needs more of those. 🙂

Sometimes when we have issues with mental fixation, it leads to exactly what you’re describing. For instance, your mind was stuck looking at the work as though that was what was needed, and you were ignoring the need. So, the whole time you were out, each breath gets compared to “what should be happening”, and on and on the mind clings, cycles, and creates clouds. “Why aren’t I working”, “why aren’t I enjoying”, “why do I do this instead of that” and so forth and so on. Whew!

Often, this happens for a few reasons. First, some fear is pushing the fixation itself… afraid that something bad will happen, afraid that we lose value, afraid we’re wasting time… it varies, but something like that pushes.

A shot in the dark is that perhaps you undervalue how important self nurturing is, how important it is to step away from work when we feel like doing so. Our body doesn’t want to be pushed to the breaking point, its not good for it. When we are relaxed, fluid minded, and open, our work becomes simple, fun, like building something beautiful. When we become overstressed, it becomes a mountain we feel we have to climb. This is why its important to be kind, gentle, and tender with ourselves. All work and no play makes the mind dull, lethargic.

It reminds me of a quote I heard (attributed to MLK Jr) “I have so much to do, if I didn’t spend a lot of time praying, I’d never get it all done). Basically, self nurturing helps us meet our work with freshness, and is an important part of being alive. Also, as a teacher, you’re exposed to higher than normal levels of stress, lots of homework, making it hard to turn off, unwind. All these conditions lead to cloudy mind, empathy fatigue, burnout and so forth. So, what to do?

Consider starting a metta meditation practice. Metta is the feeling of inner warm friendship that glows in the chest area, and produces a smooth and peaceful mind. When we practice metta, the mental momentum settles, decreasing the potency of our discursive thoughts. Said differently, if racing mind is like a spooked mare galloping along a path and crashing into brush and trees, bruising… then metta could be described as what removes all the brush and trees from around the mare, so that she quickly realizes there is little to be scared of. Then, maybe she goes an nips at some grass, smells a flower. Consider “Sharon Salzburg guided metta meditation” on YouTube, if interested. Once a day for a week, and you’ll certainly notice the difference. Twice a day for a week, and I’ll bet your wings will sprout. 🙂

Finally, when you notice that your mind is racing, what you can do is move your attention away from the thoughts, and into the feeling of breath in your body. Feel the air move past your nostrils, cooling the cavity back behind your eyes, or the rising and falling of your abdomen. Thoughts are only ripples in the mind, and you can’t beat them with “different ideas”. Rather, we move our attention away from them, and the ripples settle.

Namaste, dear friend, may your heart lead your mind toward tenderness.

With warmth,
Matt

I’m 30 years old, single with no dependants and all I have right now is my career. I have struggled with anxiety and depression for most of my life but didn’t come to this realisation until an incident in 2010 that forced me to go see my GP and then eventually a Psychologist. I only completed 4 sessions (out of 12) in my first round of CBT in 2010/2011 and only discontinued therapy because there was a miscommunication with an appointment time and I turned up to find that the psychologist wasn’t there. I barely like talking on the phone so I never called back to reschedule and just resolved to the fact that if they knew I needed more sessions they’d follow up with me but they didn’t. Eventually I found my way, got distracted with life and tried not to own the labels – anxiety, depression, dysthymia (chronic depression) – too much all the while still trying to understand what they meant. Another incident in 2012 had me back at the doctors seeking therapy again and I definitely qualified for it but yet again I couldn’t bring myself to call after the stand down period of 4 weeks and make the appointment and told myself I could figure it out again and I guess I managed okay until another incident at the beginning of this year.

I never felt like CBT addressed the underlying issue of why I felt the way I did or thought what I thought but it was all that was available to me without breaking the bank. Back in 2010 I was prescribed anti-depressants for being moderately depressed but never really being reliant on medication in general I didn’t think I needed them so opted to just do the therapy, however this time around I became a little desperate. I wanted to see if the anti-depressants could bridge the gap better than all the failed attempts at “effort” that I put in over the years. I’ve only been on them for almost 2 weeks now and I will start CBT (again) in a few weeks so time will tell.

I’ve never felt so alone, so ugly and so ashamed in this journey. Sometimes I wonder if I’m so addicted to the emotional pain and how “safe” it is (because it’s all I’ve known) that I don’t know what I’d do without it and other times I wonder if I just use it as a way to punish myself because deep down I don’t feel lovable or good enough. The advice I keep getting is to reach out to people but I just can’t seem to do that and when I do, I begin to expect more from someone than they’re willing to give then I end up hurting them with the hurt I feel because I feel so out of control with how I feel and how others treat me etc. then I end up back in that cycle that no one really cares about me or what I’m going through.

Every situation and every relationship in my life is viewed against this backdrop of mental illness – I hate it but the more I fight it the more it zaps my energy. So I can only imagine how difficult it has been for you (Ayame) to have been struggling with it for the last 10 years. My biggest fear is that I won’t or can’t have healthy relationships and I find it so unfair knowing the amount of effort I have to put in to avoid hurting other people with the hurt I already feel. Life gets so exhausting. When I decide to stop trying to fight it and try and embrace it I worry that I’m just leading myself deeper into bad habits. I’m always told that I’m a beautiful person but as soon as people experience my moods they tend to just say nothing and avoid me and I find that hard to deal with so I end up hurting them with my words and my assumptions about why they treat me the way I do, or why they abandon me (or so I feel).

I really don’t feel like there’s an end to it. I’ve been given so many techniques for “managing” my symptoms but I don’t feel like managing the symptoms deals with the real issue or the root cause and something about my situation and the way I view life makes me believe that if you can understand “why” then maybe that’s where real compassion comes from? or so I like to think. I want a way out but I also want to be understood, especially by the people in my life but that’s also alot to expect of them too, I don’t want to force myself or my situation on to others if they’re not really interested.

I’m totally lost and confused with what to do 🙁

,

Ayame, I definitely go between trying to find answers then just giving up and accepting my situation and it can seem like a never ending cycle of contradicting beliefs intertwined with anxiety. It really does help to know that there are people who get it enough to offer hope of a way through it. I know there’s no end to the “why’s” despite how quickly I forget that and still continue to ask anyway but I really do appreciate being reminded that you may never know why and it takes far less energy to accept it than it takes to fight it to no end.

Bill, thank you for sharing your journey. I feel like my adult ego shoulders the burden of processing the information about my situation/illness too but that deep down it’s actually my inner child that aches. The analogy you gave gives me a better perspective about how to approach the information and hurt now. I know I can’t change what’s happened already but I do agree that compassion is the key and not just compassion for my perfectionist self but for those I felt wronged by in my childhood.

I’m currently studying part time and one of my papers is on Occupational Stress & Resilience. It’s been so timely in terms of learning about stress techniques and we often talk about meditation and the different types that there are. Meditation is not something I would have considered doing before, it used to make me quite uncomfortable to think about but to hear how it’s worked for others I’m more open minded about it.

Thank you xo

Rebecca,

Thank you for your response. I admire your honesty, self-awareness, and articulate writing skills. In addition to practicing metta as Matt suggested, you may want to explore mindfulness, which is complementary to metta and other forms of meditation. Mindfulness enables me to block out negative thoughts and rests my mind. Cultivating compassion and having better control of our thoughts leads us closer to our true self and inner peace.

In Kindness,

Bill