To be fully present and prevent unprocessed emotions from negatively impacting others or yourself, take time to examine and feel your feelings rather than suppressing them, allowing them to naturally dissipate.
Prioritize achieving a sense of safety and acceptance within yourself, as you cannot truly create safety with another person or model healthy relationships for your children if you are not first safe and accepting of yourself.
To understand unconscious behaviors and motivations, ask yourself ‘what is the benefit?’ of a particular behavior or attachment, as these patterns often serve a protective purpose (love, safety, belonging).
Regularly ask yourself, ‘How am I complicit in creating the conditions I say I don’t want?’ to identify your role in maintaining undesirable situations and break ancestral patterns.
To truly change, you must be willing to risk the very thing that an unconscious system was set up to protect, such as a sense of identity or safety, to achieve genuine freedom.
When faced with feelings of inadequacy or the desire for more, consciously remind yourself that ‘you have enough’ as a powerful antidote to the elusive concept of insatiable hunger.
Shift your motivation from the fear of ’not being enough’ to the inspiration of ‘reaching for heaven’ – striving to do something magnificent and impactful for the joy of it, rather than out of insecurity.
Shift your definition of success from material achievements to an internal sense of satisfaction and equanimity, focusing on experiences that bring joy, love, safety, and belonging, rather than external containers.
Reflect on what lineage you want to leave behind, whether for your family, society, or the planet, using this purpose to overcome self-doubt and external pressures.
Consciously create space between a stimulus and your response, using tools like OFNR, to interrupt automatic storytelling and improve relational outcomes by allowing for reasoned rather than reactive behavior.
When triggered, consciously separate the stimulus from your emotional response, allowing your prefrontal cortex (adult brain) to take control from the amygdala, leading to more thoughtful and less reactive decisions.
Utilize the OFNR (Observation, Feeling, Need, Request) framework for communication: state a value-neutral observation, express your feeling, identify your underlying need, and make a clear request, to separate facts from interpretations and foster self-responsibility.
When triggered in a relationship, articulate ‘The story I’m telling myself is…’ to your partner, allowing you to name your feelings and assumptions without blaming, and invite a clarifying response.
Engage in a morning ritual, such as journaling, to take stock of your feelings and experiences, process what happened, and raise your consciousness to avoid operating on autopilot throughout the day.
Wake early and dedicate a few hours to silence and not engaging with the world, using this time for meditation and mindful attention to process and be present, rather than immediately focusing on productivity.
Actively teach children and ourselves how to use words to express feelings and needs, fostering the ability to articulate relational challenges without blame, rather than resorting to passive-aggressive or aggressive behaviors.
When a relationship isn’t serving you, initiate a direct conversation to express your changing needs and boundaries, taking responsibility for your own choices without expecting the other person to change, thereby building a crucial communication muscle.
When observing recurring patterns in relationships that cause harm, ask yourself ‘what is the benefit?’ of maintaining the relationship, without shame or blame, to uncover underlying motivations.
For creative endeavors, lean into the edge of external criticism by asking yourself, ‘Am I proud of what I’ve written?’ to find liberation and a sense of meaning beyond others’ reactions.
Practice resilience with discernment and skill, ensuring that perseverance and stick-to-itiveness are applied in the right ways and towards appropriate goals, rather than blindly continuing on the wrong path.
When triggered, pause, acknowledge the old programming (e.g., ‘I just went right back to childhood’), and communicate that the other person did nothing wrong, thereby creating your own psychologically safe moments through discernment.
Understand that true love is inherently safe; if a relationship does not feel safe, it is not love, and this realization can guide your relational choices.
Dedicate your life to discovering your true self, living authentically, and integrating kindness into your actions to achieve full actualization.
Recognize that it’s never too late to discover who you really are and live into that, even at an advanced age, as transformation is always possible.
Understand that continually pleasing others comes at the cost of giving up your true self, leading to a disconnect between your inner and outer identity.
When exploring unconscious patterns, resist the impulse to criticize yourself; instead, approach these structures with curiosity to understand their protective function and facilitate transformation.
When negative self-talk loops begin, acknowledge them (e.g., ‘blow it a kiss’) to release their grip, understanding that not every effort will be perfectly received, but that doesn’t equate to failure.
Explore the unconscious benefit of not accepting positive praise, as it often serves as a motivator to continually improve and avoid complacency, but at the cost of internal rewards.
To foster resilience and self-worth in your children, you must first cultivate these qualities in yourself, as your unconscious patterns and self-rejection are modeled and passed down.
Re-evaluate the belief that accepting positive feedback will lead to complacency or victimhood, as this fear often prevents individuals from taking in positive experiences.
Recognize that creating psychological safety in a relationship is also your responsibility, requiring you to overcome childhood subroutines and develop awareness of your own feelings to approach interactions from an adult perspective.