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Anthony Quintiliani, Ph.D, LADC

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December 24, 2019 By Admin

Journaling and Grief Process

Journaling and Grief Process

Regular brief journaling may be helpful in your grief and horror regarding significant personal losses of self and/or others. Here are the various ways it may be helpful to you.

  1. Writing and reading about your personal loss experience may help you to make sense of the process, and at the same time guide you gently on that path.
  2. Journaling may open up past and present realities – both positive and negative – about your loss experience.
  3. At times anger, resentments, and regrets will come up. These realities open you up to the depth of the grief experience. Do not linger too long there!
  4. S. Kierkegard reminded us that our lived experiences are processed forwardly, but better understood if observed backwards. Journaling helps to focus us on the present but never lets go fully of the past.
  5. It may be important to you to make your personal journal more balanced with both negative and positive experiences. For example, it may be helpful to list all simple pleasures you experienced in any given day. It may also be a good idea not to linger emotionally too long when such experiences trigger negative states.
  6. I have always found it helpful to list my personal gratitudes, even in the midst of painful loss and suffering. It is not uncommon for the most valued experiences to be linked with the lost love-object and your shared life.
  7. If fear and trepidation occur as you move through the grief process, I suggest that you break down the scary moments into smaller, more manageable periods of time, space, and emotions.
  8. Pay attention to and write about both helpful and unhelpful thoughts, emotions, behaviors, and sensations related to your grief process. Be aware keenly of small improvements in all.
  9. You may notice that as you slowly heal you spend less time journaling. This is natural.
  10. You may wish to do “grave worship” practices, or simply write many good things about the lost person.
  11. V. Frankl noted that when we cannot change the reality of a situation, we may have to change ourself.
  12. When you find yourself crying over your loss, that is a very good time to contemplate and do journaling.
  13. Reading related poetry or writing your own may help you.
  14. If and when you experience the emptiness of the void inside, do your best to find words for the experience. And, work to fill that void by re-engaging with your life as it is now.
  15. It is always a good idea to develop and practice personal rituals about your healing. Write about this in your journal.
  16. S. Becket reminded us that we must go on! As painful as it may be, we cannot stop the process.
  17. As P. Chodron noted, we must allow it all to fall apart before we can find the resilience to face what comes next. In most situations, what comes next is slow improvement in your emotional condition.
  18. Rest in peace with your breath, and do more meditation or yoga if that suits you well.
  19. You may wish to visit optionb.org or other sites that support grief work.

Refer to Sandberg, S. and Grant, A. (2017). Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, and Finding Joy. New York: A. A. Knopf, pp. 58-76.

Anthony R. Quintiliani, PhD., LADC  

From the Eleanor R. Liebman Center for Secular Meditation in Monkton, Vermont and the Home of The Monkton SanghaChiYinYang_EleanorRLiebmanCenter

Author of Mindful Happiness  

Mindful Happiness cover designs.indd

New Edition of Mindful Happiness in Production…Coming soon

Filed Under: Activities, ANTHONY QUINTILIANI, Calming, Coping, Crisis Resilience Skills, Emotions, Featured, Gratitude Meditation, Grief, Holiday Coping, Inner Peace, Journal Writing, Learning, Letting Go, Meditation, MIndfulness, MIndfulness Activities, Mourning, Natural Healing, Self Care, Spiriuality, Stress Reduction Tagged With: ANTHONY QUINTILIANI, GRATITUDES, GRIEF PROCESS, JOURNALING, MINDFUL HAPPINESS, RESILIENCE

September 29, 2019 By Admin

Self-Care to Reduce Compassion Fatigue

Self-Care to Reduce Compassion Fatigue

First let’s begin with what some people do to counteract the stressors of living in a hurried,“over-technologized” world. Technically, “technologize” is not a popularly accepted word, but it is a sad  reality. We live in a time when texting while driving may become the new addiction-based cause for many, many deaths. This addiction is so strong people do it in situations that could case their injury or death, or the injury or death of others. Sound familiar! It should. Cellphone “abuse” is not so different from the plans of cigarette producers to “hook” us on something we will pay for during many years. So here is a partial list of what people tend to do when faced with severe stressors.

What people tend to do that does NOT improve their stress reactivity long-term:

  1. “Smoke and Coke” – a phrase referring to smoking nicotine and drinking sugary soft-drinks when you cannot cope well and feel dragged down with your stressful life and want to feel stimulated.
  2. Of course there is always excessive alcohol and/or drug use as self-medication.
  3. Sleeping – too little or too much, including late onset and too early awakening.
  4. Eating – too little or too much, and may include binging and purging.
  5. Hoarding for whatever security it brings.
  6. Obsessive compulsive  behaviors – as behaviors for security actions to make us feel better.
  7. Being aggressive when it is not necessary to defend yourself.
  8. Insulating yourself from contact with others.
  9. Living under a “victimhood” self-identification. This can change everything!
  10. Participating in self-harming behaviors to activate neurologic, chemical and hormonal changes in your brain and body.
  11. Engagement in unsafe sexual activities to feel “excitement” and/or “loved.”
  12. Spending too much time online or on my “I-Smart” phone. The phone becomes your life!
  13. Doing too much exercise, especially when injuries occur.
  14. Being a person of uncontrollable empathy – a clear boundary issue that wares you out.
  15. Making your job too much of your life – workaholism or compensation for poor self-esteem?
  16. Making do with professional, work stagnation.
  17. Remaining stuck in impaired practices – the most common one being emotional dysregulation.

What people can do that does improve stress reactivity and may even increase joy in life:

  1. Taking brief breaks from the “grind” of work.
  2. Recognizing and contemplating personal gratitude for what you DO have.
  3. Noticing and correcting unhelpful thoughts, emotions, behaviors and communications.
  4. Learning to hold a positive, optimistic mindset and attitude.
  5. Liberating yourself from “stuckness” in anxiety, depression, addictions, and trauma. This most often requires professional help and/or self-help.
  6. Cutting way back on your online time. Researchers suggest anything beyond 3-4 hours/day is a habitual pattern. What do our jobs, schools and parents contribute to the habitual tendencies of habit-forming digital/electronic devices?
  7. Ignoring FOMO!
  8. Spending time reading, writing,  journaling about helpful things.
  9. Spending time listening and/or playing music.
  10. Spending time dancing and/or doing regular exercise.
  11. Spending time doing regular practice of meditation, yoga, tai chi, qi gong, mindful walking.
  12. Petting your dog or cat – or horse. Looking into their eyes when they allow it.
  13. Spending time walking in nature.
  14. Learning to give/get social-emotional support.
  15. Learning to leave work at work – learn to build emotional boundaries.
  16. Practice limit-setting regarding your boundaries and what you do to help others.
  17. Making a firm commitment to improve your wellness.
  18. Taking part in constructive self-reflection.
  19. Paying more attention to positives ( natural for the brain to do the opposite).
  20. Helpful nutrition, sleep and exercise practices.
  21. Learn to play more; learn to be active in creative expression.
  22. Participating in regular spiritual practices.
  23. Spending more quality time with loved ones and good friends when helpful.
  24. Leaving some time to just be in quiet, silent solitude.
  25. Seeking professional help as soon as you “feel” you MAY need it, or when others who care about you “think” you need it.

You will notice that the helpful list is longer than the unhelpful list. However, the unhelpful behaviors are often more automatic, and the helpful behaviors REQUIRE considerable effort to carry out. Your wellness must be a priority for you.

For more information refer to Bray, B. (2019). Counselors as human beings not superheroes. Counseling Today (October, 2019), 18-25

Anthony R. Quintiliani, PhD., LADC  

From the Eleanor R. Liebman Center for Secular Meditation in Monkton, Vermont and the Home of The Monkton SanghaChiYinYang_EleanorRLiebmanCenter

Author of Mindful Happiness  

Mindful Happiness cover designs.indd

New Edition of Mindful Happiness in Production…Coming soon!

 

Filed Under: ANTHONY QUINTILIANI, Calming, Compassion Fatigue, Destructive Emotions, Emotions, Featured, Inner Peace, Interventions, Mindful Awareness, MIndfulness, Recovery, Self -Kindness, Self Care, Self Compassion, Stress Reduction, Success, Tools, True Self, Well Being Tagged With: ANTHONY QUINTILIANI, COMPASSION, MINDFUL HAPPINESS, MINDFULNESS, STRESS REDUCTION

May 18, 2019 By Admin

Egolessness and Zen Buddhist Practices

Zen Buddhist Practices – Egolessness

In our practice we often inquire, and sometimes experience, the no-self and/or egolessness. What is egolessness? Who and what do we think we are? Some say that when we die the essence but not the ego lives on into new experiences. Karma and re-birth are givens in this spiritual view. Our tissue and bones, all our atoms and molecules of body-mind decompose. Eventually we return to the earth as elements, carbon dioxide, and water. The mind is purely a biologically (bio-chemical) function of existence, of being in this world. It cannot be permanent, so neither can we. The mind is a n integration and response to experiences coming into us from our sense-doors. And the ego, well that goes away along with the rest of us. The confusion that sometimes exists about being alive in this contemporary world versus living on an another or other form/s is challenging to many people. The Buddha did not deny that we exist in this samsaric world; he placed greater emphasis, however, on our spiritual, moral, and ethical development. On his death-bed he reportedly noted to his followers that everything is transient, so personal attachment to anything (people, places, things, experiences) is not recommended. This is not nihilism, nor is it some form of adverse nothingness. He called to his followers to know their own true self, and to follow the dharma in all life’s experiences. If all things are impermanent, then so is our pain and suffering. And yes, so is our joy and happiness. When unhelpful thoughts and emotions dominate, take refuge in The Buddha, The Dharma, and The Sangha. So what does this imply in day-to-day challenges of living?  Below I have noted a few Zen Buddhist practices that may be helpful to you – Buddhist or not.

  1. Stay in the present, breathe calmly, and prepare yourself to be present – to do what is required of you.
  2. Use RAIN – Recognize it is happening; Accept it; Investigate why now; and, be as close to no-self and/or egolessness as possible.
  3. Realize that your acceptance is not a passive form of being. It has energy. Energy of your mind, heart, mudra, and hara.
  4. Do your best to let go of I/Me/Mine and exist in the non-duality of it all. You are not alone! You are part of the great universe.
  5. Note to yourself that this moment of crisis or upheaval is simply another great opportunity to practice skillful living here, now.
  6. Once the anguish has passed, rest in and with yourself. Contemplate how these skillful means have helped you. Practice more!
  7. For more information refer to Okawa, R. (2007). The Challenge of Enlightenment. London, UK: Little Brown.

Anthony R. Quintiliani, PhD., LADC

From the Eleanor R. Liebman Center for Secular Meditation in Monkton, Vermont and the Home of The Monkton SanghaChiYinYang_EleanorRLiebmanCenter

Author of Mindful Happiness  

Mindful Happiness cover designs.indd

New Edition of Mindful Happiness in Production…Coming soon!

Filed Under: ANTHONY QUINTILIANI, Benefits of Meditation, Benefits of Mindfulness, Buddhism, Calming, Egolessness, Featured, Meditation, MIndfulness, Practices, Ryuho Okawa, Self Care, Zen Buddhist Tagged With: EGOLESSNESS, OKAWA, PRACTICE, RAIN, ZEN BUDDHIST

July 1, 2018 By Admin

Liberation of the True Self

Liberation of the True Self

Socrates is reported to have noted that “the secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old but on building the new.” In Buddhism there are clear relationships between “no-self” and the force of impermanence, that reality that ensures constant change and thus personal dissatisfaction as a norm.  In the lived experiences of our psychological turmoil we humans do the utmost to direct our energy to obtaining what we want (attachment, desire, craving) and avoiding as much pain and suffering as possible. Our endless effort to obtain material and status goals for some form of inner security against the world repeatedly leads us to struggle, fear, and loss – suffering. Our cognition, emotion, behavior and sensory contact with all phenomena are fully engaged in evaluation of everything: did I get what I wanted and avoid suffering for now or not? This is the hedonic treadmill of lived attachment and avoidance. Cognitive-Behavioral analytics ends up in the same place over and over again: short-term pleasure (getting what I want for now)  and longer-term suffering  (fear of losing it or being involved in more emotional pain).  This state of constant seeking (how many “likes” do I have?) tricks us into thinking that this time, it will work. We seek safety, security, and various forms of wealth; we expect to achieve these goals and to avoid as much suffering as possible. This is impossible, since the seeking and attaching itself eventually causes more personal suffering. We humans have very short memories when it comes to the realities of pleasure and pain, happiness and suffering. Our emotional striving to be perfect and get ahead often leave us with just more desire.  The sad fact is that no matter how successful we are in accumulating all the goodies, we tend to continue our suffering sometimes in different forms.

A possible solution to consider for liberating yourself from the merry-go-round of life’s seeking and avoiding is to practice intensive, regular deep meditation and yoga. Through these regular/daily practices you will, indeed, confront yourself and perhaps open a pathway to spiritual freedom. You may liberate your true self in the process. Narrowly focus on your consciousness – the mirror of your true self.  It does not change even when the content of experience does change. Become your observing self in a state of pure awareness without judging or evaluating. In the evolutionary process, clinging is one of the most primal actions. The “vapor of thoughts” along with strong attachment clinging causes our norms to be related to our false self – with its entitlement, feeling special as a defense, greed, anger, even hatred.  Just STOP all of this process as much as you can; focus on who/what you are at the deepest most spiritual levels. Who am I is the eternal and most important question. As you meditate and do yoga, concentrate on radically accepting everything that has happened to you and may still be happening to you.  This does not mean stand by and allow yourself to be abused by cruel people; however, it does mean to pay very acute attention to what experiences trigger your ego-defenses and negative reactions in thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. How much control over your emotions are you willing to give up to other people?  Radically accept as a norm, do your asanas, meditate often, allow your true self to “let go” of the false self”s ego and superego demands. Pursue spiritual practices, be compassionate and generous, and live the life your true self desires for you. This is a life of more inner peace, even tranquility, more happiness, less competition, more love, and DOING good for others. This path is difficult in our materialistic world. The fruits of your efforts will be gratifying! If you practice, you will discover the truth about being a happier, more lovable person.

If you are not satisfied with the outcomes from your efforts here are three more things to practice. When you become entangled in the ego defenses of your mind, use the Buddha’s “best friends.” Calming breath, the half smile, standing, sitting, walking or laying down all may change your neurophysiology and thus your mood and level of self-control. This will allow you better capacity to apply radical acceptance and let go of harmful  emotional reactivity.  Another approach championed by the Buddha is to gently control your second arrows.  The first arrow is when something unpleasant happens to you and there is nothing you can do about it; this is pure suffering, and it is painful.  However what you decide to have your mind, body and emotions do with the first arrow of suffering is called the second arrow.  This very sharply pointed arrow can lead to long-term, even life-long suffering about something you failed to radically accept and let go. Become an expert in perceiving the initial activity of your second arrows, and STOP as soon as possible. At this point you may apply RAIN – recognize what if happening; accept it; investigate causation; and, apply no-self or if less skilled “its not about me attitudes.” These follow-up practices should be very helpful to you in your effort to become a more calm and more happy person.

For more details see Singer, M. A. (2007). The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself. Oakland, CA: New Harbinger Publications, pp. 127-137.

Anthony R. Quintiliani, PhD., LADC

From the Eleanor R. Liebman Center for Secular Meditation in Monkton, Vermont and the Home of The Monkton SanghaChiYinYang_EleanorRLiebmanCenter

Author of Mindful Happiness  

Mindful Happiness cover designs.indd

New Edition of Mindful Happiness in Production…Coming soon!

Filed Under: Breathing, Buddhism, Calming, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Featured, Inner Peace, M.A.Singer, Meditation, MIndfulness, Self Care, True Self Tagged With: BUDDHISM, CALMING, LIBERATION OF TRUE SELF, M.A.SINGER, MEDIATION, THE UNTETHERED SOUL

June 12, 2018 By Admin

Calming Your Self-Critical Self with Mindfulness

Calming Your Self-Critical Self with Mindfulness

A core problem for many people is their incessant self (or other) criticism. This is a major part of our psychological mind suffering today. In the past life for most people was more difficult, so human basic needs were the energized priorities; today so many of us have been “spoiled” by having basic needs met and lingering with more time to worry about usually less important things.  Observe the number of TV ads aimed at improving how you look, or improving what others may thing about you. Note how the aim of some ads is to improve your perceived status, but not your inner reality of who you really are.Yes, looking ok, being healthy, and more importantly being happy are all important to our successful functioning. However, we tend to be dominated by limbic-brain survival mechanisms that boil down to interpersonal attraction and feeling liked by others. We ask: Am I good enough?  D. W. Winnicott may have some answers for us, and he would be more apt to focus on psychological well-being above superficial qualities – how we look, status,  etc.

Our competitive world and the American economic rat-race cause many to suffer from on-going “red ants” – what I call automatic emotionally loaded negative thoughts. Cognitive Therapy, Recovery Oriented Cognitive Therapy, Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy, Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy all can help reduce our thought-caused suffering. These approaches when implemented correctly work much faster than psychodynamic methods, which tend to prolong and deepen  dependency on therapists and serve mutually self-rewarding experiences (some unconscious for therapists). All evidence-based approaches work, but how well and how fast do they work? There may be a moral question involved when a therapist uses a much slower method with outcomes that are no  better than more efficient methods. They all involve a strong therapeutic alliance and clinical relationship. That also all involve a deeper change process not simply symptom reduction.

Why do we suffer so much from our own thoughts? Why do we sometimes project our own feared or actual character flaws onto and into others? There are so many causes. It all begins with the quality of our early attachment experiences. How good was the quality of your own early attachment experience with parental before thinkers like Freud came to the same conclusion. And, what about the level of your own self-medication? Do you self-medicate to reach some short-term joy or perhaps to just feel a bit better? In self-medication we eventually learn that it just works for a brief period and almost always leads to more serious problems – addictions of all kind including to our “I-Smart” phones.  figures and other caretakers? Were you reasonably satisfied and nurtured, or were you experiencing what The Buddha called dissatisfaction with what is. Did early life experience leave you craving for what you did not receive? We seek pleasure and hope to avoid pain; The Buddha noted this 2600 years ago – way, way

Below I have listed various self-critical patterns that we human have befriended. I also note some mindful ways to counteract their unhelpful emotional effects. Sometimes is means just taking better conscious control overs our CABS – cognition, affect, behavior and sensory sensations. Other times to means learning and using regularly new skills. At times it means we need professionally competent therapeutic help to improve our lives.

Do what is needed! Here the list.

  1. Self-Devaluing thoughts – STOP and be mindful of your strengths. Use the ‘doing” of your strengths as antidotes.
  2. Feeling inadequate – STOP and recall times when you had a lived experience with success no matter how small.
  3. Deep distortion of self-disdain (even self-hate) – STOP and do your best to practice
  4. mindful self-compassion.
  5. Not being “good enough” – STOP and recognize this is a social construct of unhealthy competition. Use strengths.
  6. No spiritual self – Consider what if any spiritual practice you might explore or do more of. Being in nature helps.
  7. Feeling you do not have enough – Recognize that if basic needs have been met, it is time to work harder on higher emotional needs. Stop thinking – only if I had… then I would be happy. This is almost always untrue.
  8. Hopeless perfectionism – STOP and recognize this is also a social construct based on the projections of others, who believed they were not perfect enough. These introjects became your beliefs. There is NO perfectionism; it is totally impossible to achieve it because it does not exist. Think: I am good enough as I am now!
  9. Stuck in conditioned life (samsara) – where when you are happy you become dissatisfied because it does not last, and when you are suffering you become dissatisfied because you are not happy. Craving and trying to prolong happiness and being without happiness both lead to just more suffering. Find small things to have gratitude for.
  10. A list of more mindfulnesss-based “things” you can do to counteract automatic negative thinking and feeling: live in the present moment; stay grounded with helpful cues – things are ok; allow negative thoughts to pass – do not get hooked by them; Un-trap yourself from a painful past by living presently with what is; practice radical acceptance of what you cannot change; meditate and do yoga a lot to cultivate more inner peace; practice self-efficacy in a very conscious manner; learn and live by the Four Noble Truths; let go of your shame so you can flourish; learn and use The UCLA four step process; use cognitive disputation and reframing more and more often; DO better self-care and learn to locate and “feed” your protective dragons; ask your inner self-helper for guidance on how to be healthier and happier; seek out and learn from an ethical mindfulness mentor; if possible, practice more self-love and less self-doubt. Do more of these practices more often; I believe you will find things will improve.
  11. I realize that some of you may not be aware of some of the terms noted above, so do some good “Googling” about them. When you have a set of practices you like – practice them every single day of your life.

A helpful book to read is Brenner, G. (2018). Suffering is Optional: A Spiritual Guide to Freedom…Oakland, CA: New Harbinger Publications.

Anthony R. Quintiliani, PhD., LADC

From the Eleanor R. Liebman Center for Secular Meditation in Monkton, Vermont and the Home of The Monkton SanghaChiYinYang_EleanorRLiebmanCenter

Author of Mindful Happiness  

Mindful Happiness cover designs.indd

New Edition of Mindful Happiness in Production…Coming soon!

Filed Under: Behavior, Buddhism, Calming, Featured, Meditation Activities, Mindful Awareness, MIndfulness, Self -Kindness, Self Care, Self Medication, Spiritual Energy Tagged With: ACTIVITIES, CALMING, CRITICAL -SELF, MINDFULNESS, SELF CARE

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Liberation of the True Self Socrates is reported to have noted that “the secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old but on building the new.” In Buddhism there are clear relationships between “no-self” and the force of impermanence, that reality that ensures constant change and thus personal […]

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