I am a recovering Good Girl. When I was young I learnt to be quiet when I was told to be, I did all my jobs, I got excellent grades, I didn’t complain, I didn’t get angry and I didn’t break the rules (although I did go on to break a lot of rules – with a lot of attitude – in my developing quest for autonomy.)

That way of operating rolled into my adult years. I was a good girlfriend, a good worker and a good friend. I kept making top grades in my further studies and I strived to do everything ‘right’. It was coupled with rebellion, meaning life did become somewhat polarised. I was playing 2 sides of extremes. Drugs and alcohol were a welcome relaxing relief from the pressures I put on myself to be ‘good’.

I was great at doing everything for everyone. I thrived on the approval of others. It can be an addictive kind of thing when one doesn’t do self-approval.

Over the years my game began to unravel. I pushed addiction, only to realise some damaging repercussions – physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually. I also experienced burnout a number of times from constant focus outside of myself whilst I did ‘allthethings’.  

Here are what I believe the dangers of being a Good Girl are:

• Resentment builds when you’re doing everything for everyone else. That can lead to complaining, blaming and arguing.

• Others approval becomes more important than self-approval. That means our core belief that ‘I’m not good enough’ gets ignored rather than confronted and explored.

• You abdicate your own needs to please others. It’s not uncommon to have no idea what your needs even are when you’re a Good Girl. In fact, we can expect others to meet our needs for us. That’s not healthy.

• You get tired, often the big kind of tired – exhaustion.

• Dis-ease results due to lack of connection to self, repressing our emotions and ignoring our needs. That can be physical, emotional or mental. It can even be spiritual dis-ease.

How do we break this pattern? It requires some exploration of where this habit/addiction originated. It may need some inner child work, some acceptance of your challenging history, some reparenting, learning about boundaries and some genuine self-love and care. For now, what is resonating?  What might you do to change these patterns?

Wishing you self-love – the kind that sits in your cells.
​
 
With light
Dawn


Photo by Caroline Hernandez on Unsplash

Been triggered lately? It’s a word that I’m hearing often – it’s being used to mean bothered, yet what it really means, in the psychological sense, is to have old traumas activated. It's happening to us all. I had a triggering experience that knocked me around for the best part of 2 days just recently. It's a very old sticky wound that has some deeply embedded fear attached to it. It requires a lot of presence as well as some gentle loving  behaviour towards myself. 

We usually believe being ‘stirred up’ is all about what’s happening in front of us. We don’t know that we’re overreacting (a classic sign of an old wound being touched). We might be left feeling anxious, upset, angry, guilty or shamed. Our thoughts might become judgmental and blamey – about the other or about ourselves.

If we’re brave enough to bring our attention back to our body and stay with what we are feeling we can notice what is below feelings like anger or anxiety. It is likely there is some deep sadness below the surface. This is old emotion that hasn’t been felt – trapped emotional energy that wants to release. If you allow yourself to feel it without judging yourself or someone else, you will be able to let go of heavy energy in your body – energy that may have been manifesting as long term, chronic pain. This is the benefit of being triggered. You have met a soulmate – someone who you have a spiritual contract with in order to help you grow and heal. You can thank them later for showing you more about yourself.

If you’re not aware of needing to be mindful (acting on an old default setting) being triggered can mean these sort of things happen:

• Blaming and/or judging (that makes us feel ‘better than’ and gives us some temporary pseudo power).
• Self-medicating with drugs, caffeine, sugar, carbs, alcohol – substances to ease anxiety.
• Fighting/arguing.
• Complaining to someone who will listen. (it’s another way we get power back from those who listen to us.) This is different to being supported and exploring your actions with someone who supports you to reflect.
• Being addictive in other ways to avoid the anxious feeling – excess work, cleaning, exercise, shopping, internet and the endless list of things we use to avoid our feelings.

If you are being conscious this is what could happen:

• You breathe and bring your energy back to yourself.
• You notice what you are feeling.
• You allow the feelings to flow.
• You are gentle and kind with yourself because you know an old trauma is being activated.
• You give yourself the love and support you didn’t get as a child at that time. That might look like tea and blankets, rest, being with your animals, journaling, connecting with your inner child via writing or visualization or something else.  If you need support it may be sharing with a wise friend or therapist.

Reparenting ourselves means we need better boundaries and a good connection to what we need at a given time.
I wish you conscious awareness and self-compassion when you are triggered.

with light
Dawn


​Image by Mikhail Vasilyev

 
Is life challenging you right now? If you are having a dandy old time of it lately then skip down the page to some wise words from The Dalai Llama for when you're next feeling stuck.
 
I'm feeling challenged just now. In fact it appears I am driving myself crazy as well as those close to me! After the fact I realised I was projecting some of my own frustration onto my kid which he was able to point out. Being parented by my 11 yo is one of those helpful not helpful things. Upon reflection I realise I'm feeling pressured and it's mainly pressure from myself.
 
When the path ahead is unclear our egos want control. This can have us demanding, worrying and stressing. When those things happen they can result in arguments, misunderstandings, headaches, addiction, body tension and, well, add a few of your own, there are loads of unhelpful and unhealthy by products.
 
Security and safety issues are common things that challenge us. We can easily become ungrounded when fear is up around these things. Being stuck in our head or somewhat 'out of it' doesn't lead to flow or forward movement with ease. We act from an unbalanced place. This is when we need to slow down, breathe, get grounded, connect to Higher Intelligence and remember to have faith.
 
When we observe our fear we gain perspective, we don't have to be right in it, being overwhelmed by it.
 
Here's some words from The Dalai Llama that I find helpful, maybe they help you too.
 
A given situation can be viewed as either unbearable or beneficial: it depends how we look at it.


We must make certain that things don’t begin to seem unbearable.
                                                                                                           
If we look too closely at problems we will see nothing else and they will appear all out of proportion with reality; that is when they become intolerable.

If we can stand back from them, we will be better able to judge them and they will seem less serious.
 
Don't look too closely at the problems. Stand back and remember it's all just a play.
 
wishing you flow
 
with light
Dawn