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Brandon Jamil

Transcending The Perils of Emotional Invalidation

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By: Brandon Jamil

Emotional invalidation is having your emotions dismissed, denied, and ignored. Emotional invalidation is a common experience when we have actively accepted and normalized abusive behavior. Often, we normalize abuse when the very people that proclaim to love us– abuse us. These people can be our parents, care takers, friends, family members, etc. It can be challenging to identifying poor treatment, toxicity, and abuse because society programs us that our family is by default supposed to have our best interest. Thus, they would only act in accordance with good intentions. 

 

Additionally, some people don’t have the capacity to address their own emotions and can process them. This is to say, for some, emotions can be uncomfortable because they grew up in environments where emotions where perceived as a human weakness. Having emotions meant that you could potentially bring chaos and destruction to the family unit. Which causes a greater threat–the breakdown of the family unit. We have seen these dynamics play out in myriads of ways. For instance, we tell little boys that crying is girly. Or we’ve seen girls being told that their future husbands don’t care about their useless emotions. By suppressing our emotions vs experiencing them we don’t build the skills necessary to understand our emotions. More importantly, we don’t learn and cultivate compassion, empathy, and gentleness. Which all aide us when we’re experiencing intense emotions.  

a dying rose

Then we have what I like to call the â€œperpetual positivity correctional officers.” These are the people that we go to with a grievance, and they try to remind us just how lucky we are to be alive, or they tell us that we should be happy because all the good we have done, etc. Another iteration of this can be them stating that we’re above our negative feelings and we should only focus on the good feelings. For example, “just throw away the negative thinking and your life can change.” Well, here’s the thing, you wouldn’t tell a grieving mother that just lost her son to change her way of thinking. A compassionate and caring person would understand that the first steps to healing is acknowledging that the pain is there–not go on a denial bliss mission. We would convey something on the lines of, “Let it out honey, I just let it out.” And then allow the person to gradually find their own solid footing to land their emotions.  

All of which brings us to the “did it really happen that way person.” Yes, we know this personality all too well. Usually, we go to them and share how we feel, and their retort is, â€œare you sure it happened like that? I mean you have the tendency to overreact or become too emotional in these situations.” Albeit they mean well when they state things like this, but the reality is we’re human and sometimes we just need someone to listen to us–without trying to course correct us. Now, I am not suggesting that if we’re inflicting harm on ourselves or others, then the person listening shouldn’t have a cause for concern. However, I am suggesting that sometimes the people we go to for emotional support need to understand that it’s not their job to fix us, we simply just want a compassionate ear. We must state what we need in that moment, and they can either accept or deny our request. Either way, we’ll know who and what we’re dealing with moving forward.  

Also, we have the person I call the refuser. The refuser is set on not having any emotional exchanges–for whatever reasons. Everything for this person is based on logic and logic alone. This person takes out the emotional content and believes they are doing all of us a service by not being emotionally intelligent. If your emotional material doesn’t fit into the parameters of their logic–they deem your emotional state as insignificant. When we try to reason with this person, they remain despondent and distant from us, because they hold the belief that our emotions are just unreasonable and a means for us to seek their attention or validation.  

Regardless of how emotional validation shows up in our lives, we must understand it doesn’t belong in our life. The way out is first is providing healthy space for our emotions to breathe, to exist, to have a voice, and most importantly–being able to move them out of our bodies by working with them through the body. Somatic body work and yoga are great for healing the emotions, because they all provide a safe space for the emotions to land. Similarly, we need ensure that we begin to share our emotions with people that have earned our respect, trust, and they’ve demonstrated care, tenderness, and compassion towards us–even if it’s a therapist. 

Conquering The Obstacles To Success!

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man jumping up crumbling steps

As we migrate on our voyage to tackling our goals and life accomplishments–it’s only normal that fear arises in the midst of an unforeseen obstacles. Anyone that is on a mission can testify just how crippling fear can be; which can damper our progress and bring our momentum to a halt–resulting in destitution and lack of confidence. Most of us can attest to fearing the unknown the ramifications of the possible failure we’re almost guaranteed to experience. But, let’s take a moment to understand what we’re actually fearing, and what if I were to tell you that there a way to conquer the obstacles to your success?  

In the beginning, we come up with our ideas and visions for the week, month, year, and from there we determine if our goals are short term or long term, high or low priority. The truth of the matter is, we all go about accomplishing our goals differently. Some of us research every aspect and understand the many components of our goal–this is to familiarize ourselves with the mission. Meanwhile, others of us may write it down or create vision boards, etc. With all of our plans and ideas we forget to become specific with how we achieve those goals.  

For instance, when a runner decides that they want to run a marathon, they don’t just show up to the marathon and run. To complete a marathon successfully, one must first condition themselves. Specifically, they work out every day, train their body to endure the distance, learn how to work through pain, learn how to listen to the body, and when to slow down. Thus, marathon runners make it look easy, and that’s only because they’ve done their homework and prepared.  

How do I create a solid strategy?  

“Willpower by itself is not enough. If we want to achieve lasting change, we must have an effective strategy.” – Tony Robbins 

When executing any plan it’s helpful to plan all the way until the end. As we’re planning it’s important to take our time, because this gives us time to truly contemplate every move and countermove. Therefore, every countermove prepares us for possible failure (outcomes).  

Why do I need to prepare for failure?  

Understand me when I say this: desiring to achieve your goals with optimism and positivity is very noble, but every plan has set backs and parts of your plan will fail. Let’s get comfortable with that idea now, because the sooner we can come to terms with this–the sooner we can have a strategy for any and all outcomes. As a result, when we fail, we won’t fear it, we’ll be prepared for whatever comes our way, and this is how we learn to expand ourselves.  

Why would Anyone expect failure? Shouldn’t I expect success?  

I would like to dispel a myth about failure–It’s not negative in nature. Failure is a learning opportunity to gauge to see where your strategy is measuring up or not. Of course, it’s healthy to expect success. However, we must always be ready and open for our plans to hit the wall and fall apart. Any successful person will gladly admit that it typically doesn’t work the first go around and that’s where we define our character.  

I implore you to observe billionaire, tv show host, producer, and actress Oprah Winfrey. When Winfrey created the OWN network the ratings were terrible–in the beginning. The media dragged her name through the mud, and she ended up having to restructure the television programming and go back to the drawing board several times–until she found the correct formula.  

The correct formula ended up being drama series specifically for African American audiences–thanks to the help of Tyler Perry. Winfrey did however keep her original “Super Soul Sundays” which is aimed at the spiritual seeker who enjoyed her interviews about spirituality and enlightenment. 

As a result, the Oprah Winfrey Network has made serious strides since its inception and continues to go above and beyond the media speculation and gossip. Failure has been a major part of Oprah Winfrey’s network, but she has proven that failure happens and when it does, we can pick ourselves up.  

What Can I expect After I create a solid Strategy?  

After we’ve created and begin to execute a solid strategy, we can now take BOLD action with confidence and strong will power. We will be more assured of our actions, because we’ve already done the ground work. Naturally we’ll follow our instinct and we’ll see the holes in our plans early on, and this is solely due to you being highly critical of our strategy.  

As expressed, overcoming the challenges and road blocks to our success can create uncertainty. We’ve established that creating plans without a strong strategy won’t garner the best results of our effort, and if we’re willing to have the courage to brave our failures and learn from them–our lives can ultimately be transformed. 

The Aftermath…  

In an article from Psychology Today written by Dr. Theo Tsaousides, PH.D. concludes that never pursuing our goals means not giving them a chance to materialize. The fear of failure keeps you safe, but it keeps you small. Tsaousides states that avoiding the pursuit doesn’t allow you to try new things, expose you to different scenarios, and it doesn’t expand you–allowing you to see what you’re capable of. Tsaousides believes that we if we’re able to identify our fears to failure–we can most definitely overcome them. It’s far better to fail miserably than hiding from the possibilities.  

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How To Transform Lack.

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To some degree we’ve heard the age-old adage, “change your thoughts, change your life.” This adage has helped thousands if not millions of people to personally transform their lives from a lacking consciousness to an abundant consciousness. This transcendent teaching tends to assists us with our relationships, our careers, our desired outcomes for any sector of our life—which in its own right is fulfilling. We’re instructed to think positively, place a smile on our face and feel good—the rest will take care of itself. For most of us living in the western society; this approach becomes limiting and leaving feeling vexed, because we’re not reaping the results we’re desiring. In the western world, we’re required to take an active role, and we must be willing to take action. But what if I were to tell you that you can take an active role within your life and co-create the reality in-which garners the results you desire? In this article we’ll discuss the core various sectors of our life. More importantly, we’ll explore our mental landscapes, which shape our thoughts, emotions, actions, habits, and how to change them! 

 

The Unconscious Mind: 

 

Psychologist Carl Jung refers to our unconscious mind as the shadow. It is said that our shadow is a projection of the darker aspects of our thinking, and the core beliefs that we tend to hide. It’s believed that if the shadow remains unconscious; we’ll play out the patterns and beliefs directly correlated to our mind. The unconscious mind is never satisfied no matter how much it’s fed. Our unconscious mind must be heard, and it always finds avenues to express itself. Due to the duality to life, our thinking contains both negative and positive—which creates both negative and positive actions. It’s our job to manage our shadow, and take back our power by empowering ourselves to observe our unconscious patterns, and transforming them. In-turn we change our life experiences. Changing our thinks enables us to witness exactly how we’ve created our life circumstances, where we’ve felt powerless, and where we choose to not take responsibility for ourselves.  

 

Finances: 

 

Due to the unconscious mind seeking lack, lack tends to show up in parts of our lives we’re completely unaware of. When we look at the psychology of the pay check to pay check mentality—we can witness the lack of skill pertaining to saving, investing, innovating, and creating multiple streams of income. When someone lives from one pay cycle to the next, the story that runs through their mind is: “there’s not enough” or “I have to wait to get enough” and “I am not enough.” These fundamental unconscious beliefs create our external experiences. If we believe we’re lacking because we’re not enough, we tend to treat our money transactions as such. For example: When your monthly budget allows you $250.00 of play money, and you choose to spend $450.00 which is $200.00 over the monthly budget. The overage causes set- backs in other areas (robbing Peter to pay Paul). This set back follows us until next month—having to deduct the overage. By our programming we’re going to spend over the amount and the setbacks continue—placing us in a cycle. On the outside looking in—we’d say, just don’t spend more than your monthly budget and you can save, and invest or create over time. But, having thoughts that fuel our patterns we repeat this cycle and reinforce the belief that we don’t have enough. To undo this pattern, we have to become aware of our thoughts about money and actively change our relationship with money. Every penny we spend must be accounted for and we must change the narrative. Instead of drowning in finical lack, first begin to observe exactly what thoughts and emotions are triggering you to feel as though you aren’t enough. Then take note of the behavioral patterns that you elicit from those thoughts. Then and only then can you take the proper steps to reprogramming your mind. Now we must introduce our mind to an abundant mindset. First let’s dispel the myth of abundance, so that we can get into what abundance is.  

 

Abundance: 

 

Abundance isn’t just waking up feeling good and simply allowing only good things come to us. We live in a material world that has laws, and these laws govern our human existence. We’re not supreme beings that dictate the sun and stars movement. We don’t have the ability to control the weather or nature. However, there is some truth to waking up and feeling good about ourselves. Abundance by its very nature is connected to us. Abundance can be anything from good health, joy, peace, prosperity and much gain. To activate this feeling of abundance; our thoughts and emotions must be congruent with the actions we choose to take externally. If we want to make more money, we need to understand money. Example: Instead of spending $200.00 on things that I don’t truly need, let’s ask ourselves: “how best can I invest my money?” “How is this transaction assisting my abundant lifestyle?” These questions are truly life changing, because we’re changing our relationship to money—which activates our ability to give and receive openly and lovingly.  

 

Relationships: 

 

The nature of our relationships contains both conscious and unconscious elements within the dynamic. When entering into a relationship with a lack mentality, we tend to attract and cling to people who reflect abandonment, self-avoidance, martyrdom, neglect, suffering, deception, dishonesty, betrayal. Our unconscious belief that we’re lacking shows up in our partners behavioral patterns—which we attempt to normalize dysfunctional bonding and call it love.  

 Spiritual teacher, counselor, tv show host and New York Times Best-selling author Iyanla Vanzant believes that relationships are where we go to heal. Primarily this has to do with our unconscious patterns, programming becoming conscious as we learn to connect deeper within ourselves. As we become conscious, we slowly begin to integrate abundance within our relationships. We understand that we don’t have to remain in an unhealthy relationship that is no longer serving our needs. In-turn life provides us with lessons that teach us what our needs are, and we begin to fulfill them. Our partners have the option to do the work as well, or they can remain in their current state of consciousness—we then choose how we’d prefer to empower ourselves from victim to victor. The core beliefs we come to understand is: there is enough, I am enough, I am worthy of a healthy relationship, I have the ability to get my needs met; and once we choose to embody our core beliefs–we’re bestowed with partnerships that share this commonality. First, we have to do the work, and not get attached or disheartened at our current state of lack.  

 

Career: 

 

The career sector of our life can be a tricky one, because we understand that our career is solely connected to our ability to generate financial stability. At the very least, we must have a job and make money to survive—there’s no magical thinking that can make this reality disappear. When we’re approaching our life, we must get radically clear on our career, vocation, and hobby. Example: I am a writer that creates content, edits, etc. My vocation is fiction writing, and my hobby is poetry. Career for most people is a set of skills that you get paid for—which doesn’t require deep, profound passion and love. The primary function for career is to pay the bills. Vocation on the other hand is something that we love, and most of the times it provides emotional fulfillment. We use our vocation to expand our creativity and sharpen our minds. Hobbies are what we fill our free time with; which can be anything. There’s no logical or reason for our hobbies. By getting clear on career, vocation, hobbies—We then can organize our life accordingly. When we’re generating lacking beliefs about any of these areas for ourselves, we find ourselves limited, which can make us feel isolated and stuck. By fulfilling each area carefully, we begin to create more and more abundance for ourselves.  

 Interestingly enough, many vocations have potential to generate abundance, but the issue that arises is; fear of not having enough. Are you willing to invest into that art project? More importantly are you willing to understand the business model behind the project? Can you market yourself? Are you willing to require payment for your vocation? If so, how much are you worth? When I ask people these questions, most recoil, because they’re now responsible to become the abundant version of themselves; which doesn’t permit them to make excuses as to why their vocation can’t make them money.  

 

In the end, we all have the potential to transform our lives, because we’re all worthy of abundance. It’s never a matter of class, ethnicity, and status—although we can’t deny that injustice in-fact happens in the world at large. Now that you’re aware on how to change your life from lack and scarcity to abundance and prosperity; you must now take the steps and be the epitome for others out there. Though you will have your challenges, and often times question how real is abundance, and even want to give up—take that step, take it now. Now is always and forever all we will ever have.  

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Healing Anxiety Through Mediation

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woman meditating in lotus pose
woman meditating in lotus pose

For most of us, it’s common to wake up and immediately feel stressed out about the day ahead. Bogged down with endless to do lists, responsibilities, daily practicalities; anxiety begins to loom over us, and we can’t fathom taking a moment to ourselves to truly connect, and when we do, we’re faced with re-living our anxiousness.
Suddenly, we read an article, or watch a YouTube from one of our favorite influencers—that tells us the benefits of mediation. We’re told everything from sound peace of mind, stress management, healthier mental process, etc. But we’re not sold. If life could only be so…Simple. Even though we’re not convinced, we attempt at mediation. What harm could it cause? After all, five or ten minutes in the morning is harmless right?
Finally, we find ourselves listening to guided mediations, and breathing exercises by some of the top spiritualist, thought leaders. Slowly we can see the changes in our moods, attitudes. As time progresses, we’re thinking positive, enjoying the benefits of putting the dedication, and hard work we’ve committed to ourselves.
And then… Life happens.
Something that we weren’t expecting to happen, does. Our day becomes unmanageable, we’re struggling in some aspect of our life, and the anxiety resurfaces. The feelings of powerlessness meet’s us in our need to get everything done, but the problem is… We don’t know how to handle the emotions that we’re processing—which leads us to feel paralyzed. We then believe that perhaps we just need sleep, and we can start over the next day. Until we lay down and discover our anxiety is looming over us like a black cloud.
What happened? You may ask yourself. You thought anxiety was a thing in the past. You’d overcame it and can’t identify with that person who was always on edge, who was so shaking and fragile.

The truth is, it’s easy to feel despair, and lonely when confronting anxiety. We crave control and thrive on it. We return to our mediation practice day after day, hoping that we’ll find ever lasting peace of mind. Perhaps we’ll find our nirvana. But what if I told you that losing control, feelings of despair are a good thing? Yep, that’s right!

I have personally found that mediation is best used as a tool to enable self-exploration that promotes self-awareness, profound inner peace by leaning in and looking at the painful aspects of ourselves dead in the face. Furthermore, as we observe our discontentment and dis-ease, we realize that our psyche is inviting us to embrace these so-called negative aspects that we’d rather judge, flee and abandon.

When we choose to reject feelings of anxiety, despair, discontentment we approach our mediation practice with the intention of resistance. Resistance shows up as: “I must focus on the positive.” This is to say that we spend our mediation time avoiding our truth and become undone the moment our true feelings surface throughout our day. However, we must keep in mind that our mediation practice is ours and this is the space we create for ourselves to be as naked, vulnerable as we need to, and without apology.

By allowing ourselves to lean into our discomfort, we give ourselves permission to feel out of control. Anytime we give ourselves permission to heal by first acknowledging anxiety, we build self-trust and allow feelings to surface without harshly judging ourselves or our mental state.

The moment we can release the need to neglect any part of ourselves and build self-trust— we then find ways to work with what we’re feeling and thinking. As our day progresses and the stress factors show up, we can choose to go with those feelings. Our anxiety becomes our practice by checking in with ourselves and not taking on a victim mentality. The next time you’re in your meditation, simply allow whatever feelings that exist below the surface to arise. This can be feelings of joy, peace, contentment. Or it can be hostility, pain, suffering, resentment, anger, fear. Whatever feeling you experience allow it to come out of you, allow your breath to pull it to the light and dissolve. At first you may that you can’t quiet your mind, and the restless voice that is repeating in your head won’t stop. That voice in your head has a space in your mediation. Give it some love by allowing yourself to hear it out. You will find out that there’s no need to control your thoughts or attempt to make yourself feel anything. Your job is to show up for yourself, and as you address and explore your feelings—you’ll be able to work through it with a new story that frees you from it altogether.
It can be dangerous to force ourselves to paint positivity over our traumas and anxieties, because we don’t allow ourselves to build healthy self-esteem. While it’s true that positive thinking can in-fact change our entire life, and possibly assist in our healing—we can’t skip the steps to building our mental and emotional foundations. When you’re meditating and the same old stories and anxieties come to surface, it can cause us to feel that we’re not getting anywhere. Keep in mind that healing the emotional body and mental landscape is like physical exercise. We don’t get easy results at first—we must earn it. As we persist in our exercise, we slowly begin to witness changes in the body, and we desire to push our bodies to see further growth.
In mediation, we’re not pushing our emotions. We’re setting the stage to examine them, as we consistently do that; we become comfortable with leaning into our emotions. Feeling our emotions helps us deal with our triggers. Our triggers are the body’s reaction to external stimuli. Once we allow ourselves to confront these triggers in our mediation, the body starts its own healing process. The healing process naturally helps us deal with heavy emotional weight such as anxiety.
Healing anxiety through mediation can cause us to feel overwhelmed. There are days we feel extremely happy, and the next day we can feel highly sensitive. This emotional imbalance is a key indicator that our body is regulating itself. Needless-to-say, the body and the emotions are becoming congruent; which is a shock to the nervous system. Keep in mind that your immediate inclination will be to recoil. Instead of recoiling, show up for yourself. You’ll be reminded that you can land safely now that you’re building a healthy self esteem and foundation. So, I invite you to explore, fall and get back up. Do it again, and land.

Alas,
Breath by breath. You find your center.