Latest / Silver FM 100.6 / What to do when you're too upset to think straight
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: The last time Antonio May's senior heard from his son,
- 0:03Speaker 1: it was in a note the sixteen year old left
- 0:06Speaker 1: in the family's garage.
- 0:07Speaker 2: He told me, you don't make me proud.
- 0:10Speaker 1: Antonio Junior left home to join a protest in Seattle.
- 0:14Speaker 1: A week later, he was shot and killed.
- 0:16Speaker 2: There.
- 0:16Speaker 3: I need some areth maid justice from a son.
- 0:20Speaker 1: Listen to We Keep Us Safe on the embedded podcast
- 0:23Speaker 1: from NPR.
- 0:25Speaker 2: Distress is inevitable. Pain is an inevitable part of life,
- 0:30Speaker 2: and so much of what we do our attempts to
- 0:35Speaker 2: avoid distress and pain. We drink when we're anxious, or
- 0:39Speaker 2: we lash out at people when we're angry. Those behaviors
- 0:44Speaker 2: are the result of not knowing how to tolerate what
- 0:49Speaker 2: feels intolerable in that moment, which is that emotional experience.
- 0:56Speaker 4: You're listening to Life Kit. I'm Mary el Sagara, and
- 0:59Speaker 4: you just heard from Sharen Risby. She's a professor of
- 1:02Speaker 4: psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Montefiori Einstein. She co wrote
- 1:07Speaker 4: a book called Real Skills for Real Life, and it's
- 1:10Speaker 4: filled with distress tolerance skills that come from dialectical behavior therapy.
- 1:15Speaker 4: That's a form of therapy that helps people understand the
- 1:17Speaker 4: connections between their thoughts, their behaviors, and their emotions. She says,
- 1:22Speaker 4: according to this framework, in moments of distress, we have
- 1:25Speaker 4: these two options.
- 1:27Speaker 2: We could try to change the situation that's causing us distress,
- 1:32Speaker 2: but sometimes we can't just remove the problem or solve
- 1:35Speaker 2: the problem, and so in those moments we have to
- 1:38Speaker 2: learn how to accept the distress and respond in a
- 1:42Speaker 2: more effective way.
- 1:44Speaker 4: What do you think people get wrong about coping with distress.
- 1:48Speaker 2: I think first thing that people get wrong is thinking
- 1:51Speaker 2: that I have to get rid of it right away.
- 1:53Speaker 2: Their first impulse and instinct is to do something to
- 1:58Speaker 2: make it stop. And I think the second thing that
- 2:01Speaker 2: people get wrong is the idea that I need to
- 2:05Speaker 2: do something to make it go away because otherwise it
- 2:07Speaker 2: will last forever. And so one thing that we want
- 2:11Speaker 2: people to learn is that actually, whatever it is you're feeling,
- 2:16Speaker 2: no matter how intense, no matter how awful it feels
- 2:20Speaker 2: in this moment, it will pass.
- 2:23Speaker 4: On this episode of life. GIT research backed skills to
- 2:27Speaker 4: help you tolerate distress, and these skills can make sense
- 2:30Speaker 4: in a lot of different situations. When you're stuck in traffic,
- 2:33Speaker 4: when you've got in a fight with your partner, when
- 2:35Speaker 4: your teenager is rude to you, and when you're dealing
- 2:38Speaker 4: with big life events like illness or death. Okay, So
- 2:43Speaker 4: the first distress tolerance tool we're going to talk about
- 2:46Speaker 4: here from the book is something called TIP. It's an
- 2:49Speaker 4: acronym TIP, and it actually stands for four distinct skills
- 2:54Speaker 4: that you can use in moments when you're so distressed
- 2:57Speaker 4: that you just can't think straight. You say in the book,
- 2:59Speaker 4: these are not skills to help you solve the problem, right.
- 3:02Speaker 2: Yes, exactly, And the idea is, these are skills to
- 3:05Speaker 2: help you go from let's say a one hundred on
- 3:08Speaker 2: a scale of zero to one hundred to an eighty,
- 3:11Speaker 2: and then when you're at an eighty, you might be
- 3:13Speaker 2: able to flip through the pages and find something else
- 3:16Speaker 2: to do.
- 3:17Speaker 4: Okay, So TIP is an acronym. It stands for TIP.
- 3:20Speaker 4: T is temperature. What does that mean?
- 3:23Speaker 2: Yeah, temperature is actually one of my favorite skills. This
- 3:26Speaker 2: is going to sound really weird, but it's making your
- 3:28Speaker 2: body think that you have just dived into extremely cold water.
- 3:35Speaker 2: And the reason we do that is because there's such
- 3:38Speaker 2: a thing called the mammalian dive reflex. Which is a
- 3:42Speaker 2: reflex that all mammals have that when we are submerged
- 3:46Speaker 2: in cold water, it increases the likelihood of survival, and
- 3:51Speaker 2: the reflex does things like slows down your heart rate,
- 3:55Speaker 2: slows down your respiratory rate. Those are things that we
- 3:59Speaker 2: also often need when we're in high degrees of distress
- 4:03Speaker 2: and are physiologically aroused. So the way that we practice
- 4:08Speaker 2: this skill is to get a large kitchen bowl, fill
- 4:13Speaker 2: it with very cold water with some ice cubes in
- 4:16Speaker 2: it so that it's pretty cold. You take a deep breath,
- 4:21Speaker 2: and then you plunge your face, your eyes, and your
- 4:24Speaker 2: temples in particular into the water while holding your breath
- 4:30Speaker 2: and staying there for as long as possible. For most people,
- 4:34Speaker 2: I have to say it is incredible in terms of
- 4:37Speaker 2: how well it works for people in terms of getting
- 4:41Speaker 2: that arousal to go down. I should make a note,
- 4:44Speaker 2: as we often do, that we don't recommend this for
- 4:47Speaker 2: people who have a heart condition or who are taking
- 4:50Speaker 2: beta blockers, because the sudden decrease in heart rate could
- 4:53Speaker 2: obviously be a problem for certain conditions. But if you
- 4:57Speaker 2: don't have those conditions, it's definitely worth a try, and
- 4:59Speaker 2: if you will a smart watch or something else that
- 5:02Speaker 2: monitors your heart rate.
- 5:04Speaker 5: You can actually look.
- 5:05Speaker 2: You could do a little test to see your PrePost
- 5:08Speaker 2: heart rate when you practice the temperature skill.
- 5:11Speaker 4: So that's t I is intense exercise. So are you
- 5:16Speaker 4: running up the stairs really fast?
- 5:19Speaker 2: You're doing anything you can to get your heart rate
- 5:22Speaker 2: up quickly. I taught this in a group just last week,
- 5:26Speaker 2: and we all stood up and did jumping jacks. So
- 5:29Speaker 2: the idea behind that is that it's almost paradoxical, but
- 5:33Speaker 2: in that moment of high agitation, high distress, you're actually
- 5:36Speaker 2: revving yourself up, and then when you stop the exercise,
- 5:40Speaker 2: that decrease in heart rate comes on. You feel calmer,
- 5:44Speaker 2: the endorphins kick in, and so on.
- 5:47Speaker 5: Interesting.
- 5:48Speaker 4: Okay, p is paste breathing. What does this mean?
- 5:52Speaker 2: When we're distressed and in high anxiety, we tend to
- 5:55Speaker 2: breathe from our chest, which is actually more hyperventilating and
- 6:00Speaker 2: is the opposite of relaxing. Right, It gets us more
- 6:02Speaker 2: repped up, so we want to breathe from our belly area.
- 6:06Speaker 2: The second quality of paste breathing is to slow your
- 6:10Speaker 2: breath down, and the third component of paste breathing is
- 6:14Speaker 2: that you want your exhale to be longer than you're inhale.
- 6:19Speaker 2: So you might practice this with your belly, for example,
- 6:22Speaker 2: breathing in for account of four and then breathing out
- 6:26Speaker 2: for account of six.
- 6:28Speaker 4: And then we actually have one more P which is
- 6:31Speaker 4: paired or progressive muscle relaxation, and that means like going
- 6:35Speaker 4: through your body muscle group by muscle group, tensing the
- 6:39Speaker 4: muscles as tight as you can and then releasing them.
- 6:41Speaker 2: Yes, exactly. And the idea is that if you tense
- 6:45Speaker 2: your muscles as hard as you can and then relax,
- 6:49Speaker 2: you actually get to a greater sense of relaxation than
- 6:54Speaker 2: if you just try to relax without tensing the muscle first.
- 6:59Speaker 2: And then the paired piece is to say the word
- 7:02Speaker 2: relax or to say the word calm or some other
- 7:05Speaker 2: Q word that you associate.
- 7:08Speaker 5: Then with the relaxation.
- 7:09Speaker 4: Piece, we'll have more life kit. After the break.
- 7:21Speaker 1: Of all the protests in the summer of twenty twenty.
- 7:24Speaker 4: For a moment there it was utopia.
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- 8:33Speaker 4: You have another set of skills in here that go
- 8:36Speaker 4: by the acronym improve. You say in the book. These
- 8:39Speaker 4: skills are designed to make difficult moments better in some
- 8:43Speaker 4: usually small way. Walk me through what improve stands for.
- 8:47Speaker 5: So I think.
- 8:48Speaker 2: About improve as being a set of strategies that are
- 8:52Speaker 2: available to you as tools in your toolbox for those
- 8:56Speaker 2: moments where you can't do anything about the problem right now,
- 9:00Speaker 2: but maybe there's a way to.
- 9:02Speaker 5: Make it a little bit better.
- 9:04Speaker 2: And so the acronym stands for seven separate skills. The
- 9:10Speaker 2: first is imagery in the moment of crisis and difficulty,
- 9:15Speaker 2: using visual imagery to think about something calming, going to
- 9:20Speaker 2: your happy place, bringing to mind a particular image that
- 9:24Speaker 2: is soothing and relaxing to you. The M stands for meaning,
- 9:31Speaker 2: and that's spending time thinking about what meaning you can
- 9:34Speaker 2: draw from the experience, no matter how hard it is.
- 9:38Speaker 2: So this is really hard right now, and at least
- 9:43Speaker 2: I'm learning that I can tolerate it.
- 9:45Speaker 4: I found it helpful thinking about this after going through
- 9:50Speaker 4: cancer treatment that like, now I'm like, I have more
- 9:54Speaker 4: trust that I can handle whatever comes in my life.
- 9:58Speaker 2: Mm hmm, yeah, I love that. And actually I didn't
- 10:01Speaker 2: know that about you. But I also went through cancer treatment,
- 10:04Speaker 2: and I think that I used these skills a lot.
- 10:07Speaker 2: But I actually think that I have that similar experience
- 10:12Speaker 2: where I wouldn't wish cancer on anyone, and I did
- 10:19Speaker 2: feel like it changed me in in particular ways that
- 10:22Speaker 2: I'm actually grateful.
- 10:23Speaker 4: For Yeah, I'd rather that it hadn't happened, but yes, yeah,
- 10:28Speaker 4: but since it did, you know, there is there was
- 10:32Speaker 4: something that I got out of it. I also got
- 10:35Speaker 4: like really pretty wavy hair because of it. I did chema.
- 10:38Speaker 2: I did not get that, So I experienced distress over
- 10:42Speaker 2: not getting this magical hair that people talk about.
- 10:45Speaker 4: Oh dang, I'm sorry.
- 10:48Speaker 5: I have to find other meaning.
- 10:49Speaker 4: Yeah, Okay, the pea stands for prayer.
- 10:55Speaker 2: The pea stands for prayer, and here you could pray
- 10:59Speaker 2: to God if that's something that you do. But we
- 11:01Speaker 2: also want this to be something that anyone could do,
- 11:04Speaker 2: no matter how religious or spiritual they are. And so
- 11:07Speaker 2: we also say, pray to your own self, to your
- 11:10Speaker 2: own inner wisdom, to ask for support and guidance, and
- 11:15Speaker 2: to give yourself love.
- 11:17Speaker 4: Are is relaxation?
- 11:20Speaker 2: Yeah, it's saying, in this moment that's really challenging for me,
- 11:24Speaker 2: I'm going to intentionally do something that makes me feel
- 11:28Speaker 2: a little calm and actually gives me a sense of
- 11:31Speaker 2: pleasure in some small way. So what's my favorite coffee
- 11:36Speaker 2: drink or my favorite tea that I can just sit
- 11:39Speaker 2: quietly and drink. Can I take a relaxing shower or
- 11:44Speaker 2: a bath. Can I take five minutes to just lay
- 11:47Speaker 2: in bed and relax?
- 11:49Speaker 4: Oh, is one thing in the moment, putting your full
- 11:53Speaker 4: attention into just one thing that you're doing right now.
- 11:56Speaker 5: Yeah.
- 11:56Speaker 2: So often when we're in high distress or we're freaking
- 11:59Speaker 2: out about something, our mind is in a million different places,
- 12:04Speaker 2: and in order to help us feel a little better
- 12:08Speaker 2: in this one moment, what we try to do was
- 12:10Speaker 2: to say, throw yourself completely into just one thing. For example,
- 12:17Speaker 2: you're practicing relaxation by having a cup of tea, Just
- 12:20Speaker 2: do that right, and when you start having thoughts about
- 12:23Speaker 2: what's going to come next, let that go and bring
- 12:25Speaker 2: your attention back.
- 12:27Speaker 4: And then V is for a vacation. It's like giving
- 12:30Speaker 4: yourself a little mini twenty minute vacation.
- 12:33Speaker 5: Exactly.
- 12:34Speaker 2: Most of us can't afford, either time wise or financially,
- 12:38Speaker 2: to just take a vacation whenever we're in stress. But
- 12:42Speaker 2: what is something that you could do for even five
- 12:45Speaker 2: minutes or ten minutes that makes you have that sense
- 12:47Speaker 2: of I'm just taking a break. So maybe it's looking
- 12:50Speaker 2: at a gossip website or a trashy magazine, or laying
- 12:54Speaker 2: down on the couch and watching a thirty minute TV show,
- 12:59Speaker 2: anything that gives you a sense of I am just
- 13:01Speaker 2: taking a break and I'm doing something fun and relaxing
- 13:04Speaker 2: for myself.
- 13:05Speaker 4: Okay, so the last letter is E encouragement. What does
- 13:08Speaker 4: this mean?
- 13:09Speaker 2: It basically means learn how to encourage yourself and be
- 13:14Speaker 2: a cheerleader for yourself. Some people find this really hokey,
- 13:18Speaker 2: but actually most of us are really bad at this,
- 13:22Speaker 2: which is the skill of being able to say to yourself,
- 13:26Speaker 2: you can do this, keep going. And I often say
- 13:30Speaker 2: for people that have hard time with this, it's say
- 13:33Speaker 2: to yourself what you would say to a friend, because
- 13:36Speaker 2: most of us are good at encouraging other people and
- 13:40Speaker 2: not as good as encouraging ourselves.
- 13:43Speaker 4: Even just saying it with that tone for me, helps
- 13:45Speaker 4: like you got this. Of course you got this. You know.
- 13:49Speaker 4: It's like I'm being my own friend in that moment.
- 13:52Speaker 5: And making it a little bit lighter.
- 13:54Speaker 4: Yeah, we'll have more life kit after the break, weilen.
- 14:03Speaker 1: It seems like everything is being called a recession indicator
- 14:06Speaker 1: these days.
- 14:07Speaker 7: Yeah, like the box of Hamburger helper in my pantry.
- 14:10Speaker 4: Or the new Apple Neo book, or.
- 14:12Speaker 7: The resurgence of press on nails or lipstick or no lipstick.
- 14:15Speaker 4: I've lost tracked.
- 14:17Speaker 1: There is only one way to know if these are
- 14:19Speaker 1: actual economic warning signs, though, listen to the indicator from
- 14:22Speaker 1: Planet Money, on the NPI AP or wherever you get
- 14:26Speaker 1: your podcasts.
- 14:28Speaker 4: You also have some distress tolerance skills that are more
- 14:32Speaker 4: long term, and one of them I really liked was willingness.
- 14:36Speaker 4: I feel like I haven't heard this before. When does
- 14:39Speaker 4: it make sense to use this skill?
- 14:42Speaker 2: We have to accept really difficult, challenging things in our lives,
- 14:50Speaker 2: but to accept it, we have to have a quality
- 14:54Speaker 2: of willingness to go there, as opposed to willfulness, which
- 14:59Speaker 2: is how we often operate. So willfulness is saying this
- 15:04Speaker 2: shouldn't be this way, why me, this shouldn't have happened,
- 15:09Speaker 2: he shouldn't have done that. We are constantly having should statements,
- 15:15Speaker 2: But saying he shouldn't have done that is actually kind
- 15:18Speaker 2: of denying the reality that he did do that. So
- 15:22Speaker 2: willingness is this quality of moving towards acceptance with an
- 15:30Speaker 2: open mind to say I am willing to approach this
- 15:35Speaker 2: instead of being wilful and stubborn and refusing to accept
- 15:42Speaker 2: what is it?
- 15:44Speaker 4: Makes me think about going back to getting cancer. People
- 15:49Speaker 4: would say to me, do you ever feel like why me?
- 15:53Speaker 4: You know? And I really didn't feel that too much.
- 15:59Speaker 4: I wanted to turn it around to why not me?
- 16:03Speaker 4: One in something like eight women get breast cancer, so
- 16:07Speaker 4: it was unexpected but maybe not that unusual, And that
- 16:13Speaker 4: framing actually helped me because it's like, if why not
- 16:18Speaker 4: me for this terrible thing? Then also why not me
- 16:22Speaker 4: for some really exciting things that I want to do
- 16:25Speaker 4: when I get better? You know? Why not me? Like
- 16:28Speaker 4: finally go on that trip to Japan? Or why not
- 16:31Speaker 4: me having kids? Why not me? Like living in a
- 16:35Speaker 4: beautiful space? You know?
- 16:37Speaker 2: Yeah, it's interesting because it reminds me of I think
- 16:41Speaker 2: this is more of a of a zen practicer saying
- 16:44Speaker 2: where it's kind of like experienced the non headache or
- 16:47Speaker 2: the non toothache that when we have a headache or
- 16:51Speaker 2: a toothache or full attention is drawn to that, and
- 16:55Speaker 2: we might have those kinds of thoughts why me?
- 16:59Speaker 5: Why now?
- 17:00Speaker 2: What about all the moments that we don't have a
- 17:03Speaker 2: headache or a toothache? We don't say why me in
- 17:07Speaker 2: those moments?
- 17:08Speaker 5: Right?
- 17:10Speaker 2: And so can we learn to be willing to accept
- 17:15Speaker 2: and embrace the reality of whatever life gives us, all
- 17:22Speaker 2: of the positives and all of the negatives.
- 17:25Speaker 4: Some of this is changing your thoughts, but then there's
- 17:29Speaker 4: also changing our posture. Tell me about that.
- 17:34Speaker 2: So often when we are feeling willful, we would likely
- 17:39Speaker 2: find that our body is tense in some way. Perhaps
- 17:44Speaker 2: our shoulders are up, our jaw is clenched, and so
- 17:48Speaker 2: there are ways that we could focus on changing our body,
- 17:54Speaker 2: and by doing that we can actually send signals back
- 17:58Speaker 2: to our brain that, oh, this is not so terrible. So,
- 18:02Speaker 2: for example, having what we say is a willing posture,
- 18:07Speaker 2: which is kind of often opening up your chest, you know,
- 18:11Speaker 2: sitting or standing upright, pushing your shoulders back, and adopting
- 18:17Speaker 2: willing hands. Is a phrase that we use where if
- 18:20Speaker 2: you're sitting, you sit with your hands face up in
- 18:27Speaker 2: your lap, and it's such a subtle and small thing,
- 18:31Speaker 2: but if you notice what happens if you're sitting and
- 18:35Speaker 2: you just place your hands gently on your lap, palms up,
- 18:41Speaker 2: it's almost like a signal to your brain, to yourself,
- 18:45Speaker 2: to the world, I am open, meaning I am accepting
- 18:50Speaker 2: of what's happening.
- 18:51Speaker 5: And the other thing that we do.
- 18:53Speaker 2: With our body is adopt what we call a half smile,
- 18:56Speaker 2: where we very gently and sometimes very sub turn up
- 19:01Speaker 2: the corners of our mouth ever so slightly to adopt
- 19:07Speaker 2: that more serene facial expression actually communicates back to your
- 19:12Speaker 2: brain that things are okay.
- 19:15Speaker 4: I imagine that this advice would be very helpful for
- 19:18Speaker 4: some people, and then it'll really annoy others who are like, yeah,
- 19:22Speaker 4: but I'm dealing with something really difficult, or like this
- 19:25Speaker 4: isn't going to solve my problem, or it almost feels like,
- 19:30Speaker 4: you know, toxic positivity or something. You know, like just
- 19:35Speaker 4: put a smile on your face and then all these
- 19:39Speaker 4: horrible things that are happening are fine.
- 19:41Speaker 2: Yeah, all things that I hear on a daily basis
- 19:44Speaker 2: when I teach these skills. So a couple of different
- 19:47Speaker 2: things that I say in response. So one is increasing
- 19:52Speaker 2: the number of tools that you have in your toolbox.
- 19:55Speaker 2: So I want you to have all of the tools
- 19:58Speaker 2: as many as you can pos have, and that doesn't
- 20:01Speaker 2: mean that you're going to use all of them, but
- 20:04Speaker 2: you have them all and they're available to you. The
- 20:07Speaker 2: second thing is that this is all an experiment, gather data,
- 20:13Speaker 2: try it. You have these thoughts that this isn't going
- 20:16Speaker 2: to work or it's just going to lead to some
- 20:19Speaker 2: other terrible outcome. Just notice that, but try it, practice it,
- 20:24Speaker 2: and report back let me know how it goes. The
- 20:27Speaker 2: third piece is this whole idea that we are trying
- 20:31Speaker 2: to give people skills to manage distress, as we've been
- 20:35Speaker 2: talking about, but also skills to solve problems. So, if
- 20:41Speaker 2: you know you're in this horrible relationship that you feel
- 20:43Speaker 2: like you can't get out of, how do you use
- 20:46Speaker 2: the distress tolerance skills in moments when you need them
- 20:50Speaker 2: to help you cope with a really difficult moment. But
- 20:52Speaker 2: at the same time, how are we going to either
- 20:55Speaker 2: change this relationship or get you out of this relationship
- 21:00Speaker 2: in a way that's more sustainable and also will lead
- 21:03Speaker 2: to overall greater peace and happiness and less negativity.
- 21:09Speaker 4: Yeah, these skills are not meant to solve your problems exactly, Serene,
- 21:14Speaker 4: thank you so much for this, Thank you so much
- 21:16Speaker 4: for having me all Right, time for a recap. Let's
- 21:21Speaker 4: go through the skills we learned. Take away one tip
- 21:24Speaker 4: skills These are helpful in moments when you're so distressed
- 21:27Speaker 4: that you can't think straight. Tea stands for temperature specifically,
- 21:31Speaker 4: dunk your face in a bowl of cold water with
- 21:34Speaker 4: ice to trigger your mammalian dive reflex, which will bring
- 21:38Speaker 4: down your heart rate and get you breathing slower. I
- 21:42Speaker 4: stands for intense exercise. Do some jumping jacks, run up
- 21:45Speaker 4: the stairs. PEA stands for paste breathing. Make sure your
- 21:50Speaker 4: exhale is longer than your inhale, and P also stands
- 21:54Speaker 4: for paired muscle relaxation. Squeeze a muscle, then relax it
- 21:58Speaker 4: while saying a word like relax. You can do that
- 22:01Speaker 4: in a sequence from head to toe. Take away two.
- 22:05Speaker 4: We have the improved skills. These are designed to make
- 22:08Speaker 4: difficult moments better in some small way. I stands for imagery.
- 22:13Speaker 4: Think of a scene that calms you down. M stands
- 22:16Speaker 4: for meaning. Not everything happens for a reason, but this happened,
- 22:20Speaker 4: and it does have meaning in my life. P stands
- 22:23Speaker 4: for prayer. Go inward and connect with the divine. And
- 22:27Speaker 4: if you don't believe in God, try praying to your
- 22:29Speaker 4: wisest self. R is for relaxation. Do something that you
- 22:33Speaker 4: know reliably relaxes you. Drink some tea, watch your favorite
- 22:37Speaker 4: TV show from the nineties, pet your dog, O is
- 22:41Speaker 4: one thing in the moment. Focus completely on one thing
- 22:45Speaker 4: that you're doing right now. V is vacation. Give yourself
- 22:49Speaker 4: a ten or fifteen minute break from everything now checking messages,
- 22:52Speaker 4: no working, just vacationing. And E is for encouragement. Remind
- 22:58Speaker 4: yourself you got this and mean it because you do.
- 23:03Speaker 4: Last late takeaway three try the skill of willingness, which
- 23:06Speaker 4: is useful when you're dealing with a longer term situation
- 23:09Speaker 4: that's causing you distress and you find yourself denying reality,
- 23:13Speaker 4: trying to control everything, or focusing on what should have
- 23:16Speaker 4: happened instead, Yeah, you're right, they shouldn't have done that,
- 23:20Speaker 4: and this shouldn't have happened to you, but it did.
- 23:24Speaker 4: Accepting that can be a helpful distress tolerance tool. One
- 23:28Speaker 4: way to indicate willingness to your brain is to adopt
- 23:31Speaker 4: a willing posture. For instance, sit with your hands in
- 23:35Speaker 4: your lap, turned up toward the sky. It's a simple
- 23:38Speaker 4: postural shift. Now, I want to be really clear, these
- 23:42Speaker 4: tools are not meant to solve your problems. They're options
- 23:45Speaker 4: for how to get through difficult moments. We can't always
- 23:48Speaker 4: change the situations or conditions causing us pain. But even
- 23:52Speaker 4: when we can. We still need tools to take care
- 23:55Speaker 4: of our bodies and help us keep our heads on
- 23:57Speaker 4: straight while we problem solve and change the world. All right,
- 24:02Speaker 4: that's our show. Before we go, we'd love your help.
- 24:05Speaker 4: Would you please rate and review Life Kit in your
- 24:08Speaker 4: podcast app? Tell us a favorite tip you've learned, or
- 24:11Speaker 4: which episodes you like the most. This episode of Life
- 24:14Speaker 4: Kit was produced by Sylvie Douglas and Claire Maurie Schneider.
- 24:18Speaker 4: Our digital editor is Malica garib and our visuals editor
- 24:21Speaker 4: is c. J. Rikalan. Megan Kane is our senior supervising editor,
- 24:24Speaker 4: and Lauren Gonzalez is our executive producer. Our production team
- 24:28Speaker 4: also includes Andy Tagle and Margaret Serino. Engineering support comes
- 24:32Speaker 4: from Jimmy Keeley, fact checking by Tyler Jones. I'm Mariel Sagara.
- 24:37Speaker 4: Thanks for listening.
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- 25:08Speaker 3: Oh hey there, I'm Brittany Loose and I don't know,
- 25:11Speaker 3: maybe this is a little out of pockets to say,
- 25:13Speaker 3: but I think you should listen to my podcast. It's
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- 25:27Speaker 3: out why listen to the It's Been a Minute podcast
- 25:29Speaker 3: from NPR Today.