Why Compassion is Much More Helpful Than Sympathy

In prior blog posts, I've written about the importance of compassion for others as well as compassion for ourselves, referred to as self compassion:  

Developing Curiosity and Self Compassion in Psychotherapy

Psychotherapy and Compassionate Self Acceptance 

Are You Gazing at the Sky Through a Straw? 

In the current article, I would like to focus on the difference between compassion and sympathy, which are often confused.

Why Compassion is Much More Helpful Than Sympathy

Comparing Sympathy and Compassion

With regard to sympathy, there's a vivid memory that stands out in my mind from the time I was about five years old.  My mother and I were standing on line in front of a subway token booth to buy tokens to go on the subway.  Just ahead of us, there was an elderly man, probably in his late 80s, who was trying to pay for tokens with change in his hand.

But every time he tried to hand the token booth clerk the money, he would drop all his change because his hands were trembling so badly.  Whenever he would drop his change, I would hurry to pick up the coins to hand them back to him.  But no sooner did he try to hand the coins to the token booth clerk than he would drop them again.  I remember feeling very upset that this old man, who looked so sad, was by himself and helpless to hold onto the coins.

Finally, after the third time, my mother gave the change to the token booth clerk, and the elderly man was very grateful.  Then, we went our separate ways.

As my mother and I walked onto the train, I could feel the emotional upset welling up inside me.  I was trying, as best as I could, not to burst out crying.  But when my mother said, "That poor man...," I couldn't hold it in any more, and I burst out crying.  I could easily imagine this elderly man being my grandfather and, at such a young age, I took on this man's emotional pain.

My mother was taken aback at first that I had such a strong emotional reaction, but then she comforted me, and she allowed me to talk about how badly I felt for the old man with the trembling hands.

As a child, I didn't have the capacity that I developed as an adult to be able to dip into another person's experience with compassion, but to remain grounded in my own experience.  The ability to empathize allows us to care about others with compassion without taking on the other person's emotional pain, which is what we do when we feel sympathy.

Compassion is much more helpful because, even though we feel aligned with their emotions, we are in a better position to help as compared to when we're immersed and weighed down by their feelings.  

Standing Outside of the Emotional Vortex

When I explain this to clients in my psychotherapy practice in NYC, I often talk to them about it by giving the metaphor of "standing outside of vortex."  So, when a friend or family member is in crisis, it's not helpful to them if you've jumped into the emotional vortex with them.  Rather than being helpful, you're immersed in the same emotions.

When you're "standing outside the vortex," you can see and sense everything that is going on, but you're still on solid ground and have a bigger perspective than the person who is in crisis.  You're better able to help your loved one as well as yourself.

About Me
I am a licensed New York City psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.

I work with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotheapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Staying Emotionally Grounded During Stressful Times

We all go through difficult times at various points in our lives. Often, these are times when we can't control what is going on around us. All we can do during these times is to try to stay emotionally grounded to maintain our physical, mental and emotional well being. How each of us does that is a very individual process, and it helps to know or, at least, be willing to find out, what is helpful to you, in particular, to stay emotionally grounded.

Staying Emotionally Grounded

What Does It Mean to Be "Emotionally Grounded"?
People have different definitions for what it means to be emotionally grounded. For me, being emotionally grounded means that you are relatively calm and centered within yourself. You feel yourself to be whole and present.

Many times, when you're in a difficult situation, you might have to center yourself often throughout the day in order to cope. The 12 Step concept of "One Day at a Time," where you only deal with your problem in the present and not worry about what will happen too far in the future, can be modified to "One Hour at a Time" or even "One Minute at a Time" if it helps you get through it.

Even in very difficult situations, people often find ways to stay emotionally grounded by tapping into their own internal emotional resources as well as external resources among family, friends and their community. That doesn't mean that they don't suffer or feel grief or loss. It often means that whatever they're going through is mitigated by internal resources and external support.

How to Stay Emotionally Grounded:
Often, depending upon the situation and whatever else is going on in your life, being emotionally grounded means slowing down. Seemingly small steps can make a big difference.

For instance, for most people, when they're highly anxious, their breathing becomes shallow and constricted, which only makes them more anxious. So as strange as it might sound, these people need to remind themselves to breathe more deeply. It can be as simple as reminding yourself to take a deep breath from time to time to calm down your nervous system. You can also focus on the quality of your breath as you breathe in and breathe out. Focusing on taking in a calming breath and breathing out the tension that you feel can help to calm you down.

Feeling emotionally grounded can also mean that you focus on feeling your feet firmly on the ground. When you do that, you become aware that the ground beneath your feet is solid, and this can help you when you feel overwhelmed. Even in situations when you can't do deep breathing, you can almost always feel how solidly your feet are planted on the ground, and you can do this without anyone else being aware of what you're doing.

Your attitude in many situations can also make a big difference in allowing you to feel emotionally grounded. So, for example, if you're dealing with someone who is being difficult, your attitude in the situation can make the difference between feeling grounded and feeling upset.

One example of this is when you're dealing with an angry coworker. If you respond to your angry coworker by becoming hostile yourself, you're just adding "logs to the fire." Both of your emotions will escalate and make the situation worse. So, at those times, when you might feel like lashing right back at your coworker, it's better to take a moment, breathe, think twice, and try to find a centered place within yourself. This isn't easy, especially when you're first learning to feel emotionally grounded in difficult situations. But if can be of enormous benefit to you and the other person.

It's usually a good idea to remember that the other person's hostile behavior might not really have anything to do with you, even though you might be the recipient of it. Many years ago, when I was a human resource manager, I remember receiving a call from a department manager about an employee who snapped at a coworker, which resulted in a loud argument in the office. The manager told me that Jane (not her real name) was usually cheerful and friendly, and it was very uncharacteristic of her to snap in this way.

When Jane came to my office, she was already feeling remorse for her outburst. She went on to say that her husband was just hospitalized and she was very worried about him. She also said that she had hardly slept in the last few days, and she was feeling tired and irritable. It was clear from what she said that she had not asked friends or family for any support because she felt that she "should" be able to handle this on her own. She also felt overwhelmed by the hospital system. On a practical level, I talked to Jane about what she could do to talk to the doctors, nurses and the social workers at the hospital who were involved in her husband's care to ensure that her husband would get appropriate treatment and a good discharge plan. On an emotional level, we talked about how she could elicit emotional support from her environment and how difficult this was for her.

After our talk, Jane breathed a sigh of relief, and she went back to her office and apologized to her coworker. Jane and her coworker had worked together for many years, and the coworker was immediately forgiving and accepting of Jane's apology when she heard about Jane's husband's hospitalization. She was also sorry for snapping back at Jane and not realizing that something else might have been going on. When I spoke to Jane's coworker (let's call her Mary), Mary told me that she also felt overwhelmed by her grandchildren, who were staying with her for a month. So, it was apparent that Mary was also going through her own personal challenges.

When I checked back with Jane, Mary, and the manager a week later, they each told me that the situation was resolved. Jane and Mary also told me that, because of this situation, they learned to try not to personalize another person's reactions towards them, and that a person's reaction might not have anything to do with them. Jane also told me that she was feeling better because she asked her sister for support, and her sister came to stay with her.

Stress Management:
Rather than waiting until something happens to learn to feel emotionally grounded, it's usually best to find ways to manage your every day stress. This could mean learning to meditate, taking yoga classes, going for regular walks or other things that you might enjoy that help to reduce your daily stress. If you learn to manage your stress on a daily basis, more than likely, you'll cope better when difficult situations arise.

You will also build and strengthen your resilience. A sense of resilience is just as important as feeling emotionally grounded when you're faced with difficult challenges. Being resilient means that you're more likely to bounce back from hard times. When someone is emotionally resilient, he or she is more likely to cope better with hard times than someone who is not. Even if you don't start out being very resilient, you can learn to build your sense of resilience and this is something that I often focus on with new and existing clients.

Getting Help in Therapy

When new clients come to see me in my psychotherapy private practice, early on, I usually ask them about their coping strategies and I get a sense of their emotional resilience. If their coping strategies are limited, this often becomes one of our first priorities. In the beginning, it's a matter of finding out what works best for each of them and what they will be most likely to do on a regular basis to reduce their stress and increase their emotional resilience.

Learning to be emotionally grounded is a skill like many other skills--the more you practice it, the better you get at it and the easier it becomes for you. And the more skilled you become at being emotionally grounded, the better it will be for your overall health, resilience, and well being.

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR, and Somatic Experiencing  therapist.

I work with individuals and couples, and I have helped many clients to learn to become more emotionally grounded.

To find out more about me, visit my web site: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.


photo credit: Jos van Wunnik via photopin cc

Overcoming Self-Limiting Beliefs About Yourself

Our core beliefs about ourselves and others often have a profound unconscious effect on how we live our lives and the choices that we make. These core beliefs are usually formed early in life. It's important to understand these beliefs so that we can understand how they are impacting our lives and we can decide if we want to change them.

Overcoming Self-Limiting Core Beliefs

Listening for Core Beliefs in Psychotherapy Sessions
When I'm in psychotherapy sessions with clients, especially early in treatment, I listen for their core beliefs in our discussions. These beliefs are often stated in indirect ways.

For instance, if a client is talking about feeling lonely, about not being in a relationship for many years and that she has no desire to be in a relationship but she doesn't want to be lonely either, I would want to know more about her prior experiences in relationships. If she tells me that her last breakup 10 years ago occurred because of "the usual problems that women have with men," I would want to know more about what this means to her. If I ask her about it and she tells me, "You know, the usual reasons why most relationships don't work out with men--he cheated on me."

Exploration of Self-Limiting Core Beliefs in Psychotherapy
As we explore this further, I might learn that this client believes it's inevitable that men cheat on women, they can't be trusted, so it's pointless to get involved in relationships because it will only bring pain and sorrow.

As we continue to explore this, she might tell me about all of her other relationships where her boyfriends cheated on her, as well as her friends' relationships where the men cheated, and her parents' relationship. She might say something like, "My father had a lot of other women on the side. It made me so angry that my mother put up with it. I vowed to myself that I'd never put up with a man cheating on me, but every man that I've ever been with has cheated. Men are like dogs, so, it's better to not even be in a relationship".

This exploration has revealed a few self-limiting core beliefs about men and, possibly, about herself. One core belief is that all men cannot be trusted. So, starting from that premise it's clear that she has low expectations of men in relationships. Her expectation is that it's inevitable that if she's in a relationship with a man, she'll be hurt. So, based on this belief, in her mind her choices are to either get hurt or to be lonely. When she was younger, she was willing to try to be in relationships, even though she had low expectations. But time after time, she got hurt. So, she decided that it's better to be lonely than to get hurt. But that makes her feel unhappy too, so neither choice has worked out for her, which is what brought her to therapy in the first place.

Another possible unconscious core belief might be that she doesn't deserve to be treated well. So, if, as the client continues to come to therapy sessions, she talks about how her father often told her when she was growing up that she was "nothing," then we might begin to understand why, on an unconscious level, she internalized this, why she tended to choose men who would mistreat her and confirm these beliefs that she internalized about herself as well as her beliefs about men and relationships in general.

Self-Limiting Core Beliefs due to Trauma
These kinds of self-limiting core beliefs are usually formed in early traumatic experiences, not necessarily one big trauma, but repeated trauma over time. For the client described above, she might not even see the trauma related to her father repeatedly telling her that she was "nothing." She might say, "I didn't have any trauma when I was growing up. Nobody beat me. My father said these things to me and that's just the way it was. You know, that's just how men are." So, the experiences and the resulting beliefs are deeply ingrained in this client.

She believes she has a lot of "proof" that substantiates her way of thinking and rather than seeing these beliefs as her feelings and opinions, she sees them as "facts." As such, they become self fulfilling prophecies. She believes she doesn't deserve to be treated well, men are always unfaithful so, on an unconscious level, she chooses men that will confirm her beliefs about herself, men, and relationships.

For many clients, it takes a while to be able to step back from their core beliefs to be able to examine them. But when they are able to do this, it can be a very powerful experience. It often comes as a revelation to them that they've been operating under certain assumptions that they believed to be facts. If they're able to step back and explore the basic premises of their beliefs, it can open up many new possibilities in their lives.

So, for example, in the fictitious case above, which represents a composite of many different clients, this client can continue to hold on to her core beliefs about herself, men, and relationships in general, and continue to feel that she's caught between two unsatisfactory choices--pain or loneliness. In that case, she would live out the rest of her life being driven by these self-limiting core beliefs, living a sad and lonely life. Or, if she is willing, she can question her core beliefs, despite all the "proof" that she might feel she has, explore the origins of these beliefs and discover her own self fulfilling patterns that continue to perpetuate these beliefs.

At that point, she can begin to become more aware of the type of men that she chooses (i.e., men who will confirm her beliefs) and start to learn in therapy how to choose men who will treat her better. If she's able to do this, she will be able to free herself from her personal history and live a happier life.

It's essential to our happiness and sense of well being that we question our self-limiting core beliefs about ourselves as well as others, and recognize that we might be living our lives under a set of beliefs that limit our possibilities and make us unhappy. When we're able to challenge our self-limiting core beliefs, we can begin to free ourselves so that we can live more fulfilling lives.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist. 

I work with individual adults and couples.

I have helped many clients to overcome self-limiting core beliefs so that they can lead more fulfilling lives.

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To make an appointment, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Are You "Keeping Busy" to Avoid Painful Emotions?

People often try to avoid experiencing painful emotions by constantly "keeping busy."  To suppress their sadness, anger or other uncomfortable emotions, they keep themselves in a state of constant distraction.

Are You "Keeping Busy" to Avoid Painful Emotions?

The amount of emotional and physical energy that it takes to stay on the go and suppress these uncomfortable feelings can be enough to exhaust anyone.  And, in the end, it serves no real purpose, except as a delaying tactic.  In the end, these emotions remain in the body, and they can manifest in a compromised immune system and, possibly, illness.

Well-meaning friends and family members sometimes give unhelpful advice

Over and over, I hear my psychotherapy clients tell me that their well-meaning friends and family members have advised them to "keep busy," even when the clients begin feeling worse by all this extra activity.  This often goes along with the advice, "Just put it behind you" before the person has had a chance to experience an uncomfortable emotion.

When you're upset, it's easy to think that your natural inclination to take time for yourself is, somehow, "wrong" and your friends and family are right about staying busy.  Then, eventually, when you can't sustain it, you might feel like there's something wrong with you.  

You wonder, "Why can't I do this?"  Well, you can't do it because it's not what you were meant to do in order to take care of yourself.

Feel the emotions, without the need for constant distraction, as part of self care

Whether the emotions are about the death of a spouse, a divorce, the loss of a job or any other unfortunate event, you need to feel your emotions without being made to feel that there is something wrong with you.  

There's no way to avoid painful feelings

Somewhere along the way, as a society determined to pursue life, liberty and the state of happiness, we seemed to have come away thinking that we should never feel any uncomfortable emotions.   

And if we do, these emotions should be stamped out as quickly as possible.  And, yet, when we look at the course of a long life, we can see that it's made up of a combination of joy and pain.  There's no way to avoid it.

When we try to avoid feeling painful emotions, we prolong the pain

When we attempt to avoid feeling painful emotions, we actually end up prolonging the pain rather than just feeling the emotions and, when the time is right, releasing them.  

A friend's experience of trying to avoid feeling the pain

Many years ago, a friend, whose husband left her unexpectedly for another woman, was trying to follow her sister's advice to stay constantly "keeping busy."  (My friend gave me permission to write about her experience because she thought it would be helpful to others.)

Her sister came to my friend's home, dragged her out to dinners and movies.  Whenever my weary friend would ask me about this, I would tell her that I didn't think it was a good idea for her to exhaust herself in this way--that she needed time to herself.  But, after years of accommodating herself to others, she felt that she couldn't let her sister down.  She didn't want to seem ungrateful, so she went along with it.  

A few weeks after the marital separation, her sister wanted to host a dinner party for my friend, hoping to cheer her up.  Once again, my friend asked me what she should do.  Seeing how exhausted and irritated she looked, I asked her what she thought it would be like for her.  

After she thought about it for a few seconds, she broke down in tears.  The pressure felt overwhelming.  She summoned her courage, called her sister and rejected the idea.  

Then, my friend went home and, for the first time since her husband left her, she cried. Afterwards, she experienced a wave of relief.  Then, a day or so later, the next wave of pain and disbelief about her situation came over her again.  Rather than resist the pain, each time she felt the next wave, she went with it and she released it.  

A week or so later, she began to feel a surge of rage about what her husband did.  She punched pillows.  She yelled.  She cried.  She called to vent, and she allowed herself to release the emotions in a way that felt right for her.  She also used this surge of angry energy to get organized and to hire an attorney to protect her interests. 

After a while, she came to accept that her sadness and anger came in waves and, although it was excruciatingly painful at times, she felt better allowing herself to feel her emotions rather than suppress them.  After several months passed, she was able to look back and notice that her pain was not as great as it had been at the beginning.  

Of course, everyone's experience with painful emotions will be different.  Just know that there's nothing wrong with you if you don't feel like immediately going out dancing after a significant loss.

You don't have to go along with what others think is best for you, and you don't have to run from your feelings.

You don't always have to be engaged in constant activity.  Sometimes, you just need to be still.

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist. 

I work with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Are You Gazing at the Sky Through a Straw?

Sharon Salzberg, cofounder of the Insight Meditation Center in Barre, MA, writes in her autobiographical book, Faith: Trusting Your Own Deepest Experience, that Buddhists have an expression that they use called "gazing at the sky through a straw." She says this expression is a metaphor for holding onto narrow, fixed beliefs and allowing these beliefs to become the whole of our existence. 

Expand Your Vision

Rather than seeing the vastness and beauty of the sky, when we gaze at the sky through a straw, we only see a very small part of the sky and yet we think we see all of it. We don't realize that we're depriving ourselves.

I enjoy reading about people's personal quests, and I'm enjoying reading about Ms. Salzberg's quest.  She writes about overcoming childhood trauma through her explorations in meditation and Buddhism. She also discusses how, at first, she clung to her particular beliefs because they helped her to feel secure, and how she had to learn to be more open and questioning about her beliefs lest they become dogma.

Compassion and Empathy
While reading this book, I've begun thinking about what it means when we become rigid in our beliefs and ways of doing things. In telling the story of her personal evolution, Ms. Salzberg provides an excellent example of why people often hold rigidly to their particular ways, and how they can feel threatened by other people's views. We see this every day in our personal encounters with people as well as in our own government where adherence to rigid beliefs has created gridlock in our Congress, and we see it internationally between countries.  We can see it in ourselves.

If you're dealing with someone who has rigid beliefs that are creating tension between you and this person, it's not enough to tell them, "Don't be so rigid" or "Chill out." It's much more helpful to take a moment, step back and try to understand what this person's particular stance means in the context of his or her life. Then, even if you don't agree, you might still feel some empathy and compassion for this person.  You can also look at your own struggles with rigidity and feel compassion for yourself.

My Uncle Joe:
While reading Faith," I thought about my Uncle Joe. My Uncle Joe passed away from a sudden heart attack at the young age of 43. But when he was alive, he was "the rock" of my father's family. Although he wasn't the oldest, he might as well have been. He was the one that everyone depended on.

As a young man, he had never been away from home until he was drafted into the Army during World War II. Both he and my father were sent to the South Pacific where, undoubtedly, they saw unspeakable atrocities. "Unspeakable" being the operative word because neither he nor my father ever spoke about the war. When Uncle Joe came back from the war, he moved back in with my grandparents and his brothers. Having experienced the war in the South Pacific, I think he felt secure coming home to the household traditions in my grandparents' home.

Uncle Joe was a very kind and generous person. If you came to visit him and you complimented him on something that he had (whether it was a set of cuff links or a new clock), he would insist that you have it.

I'll never forget the time that one of his cousins, Junior, admired a new vacuum cleaner that Uncle Joe had just bought. Actually, I think all that Junior said was, "Oh, that's nice." 

No sooner had the words left Junior's mouth than my Uncle Joe was trying to put the vacuum cleaner in Junior's hands, insisting that he have it. Junior was red-faced with embarrassment because he never meant to say that he wanted it. And there were the two of them pushing and pulling this vacuum cleaner back and forth, each one insisting that the other have it. Finally, Junior said his goodbyes to all of us very quickly and he practically ran out the door with my Uncle Joe still insisting that he wanted him to have the vacuum cleaner.

When we were younger, my cousins and I didn't know that the sumptuous Sunday dinners at my grandparents' house were provided courtesy of Uncle Joe. As children, we never thought of such things. In many ways, we took for granted the loving, nurturing, child-centered environment in my grandparents' home. It was all that we ever knew so how could we think that it could ever be different?

In many ways, we were protected as children. As hard as it may be to believe (and even I can't believe it myself when I think about it now), as children, we never knew that my grandmother was suffering with cancer. She had an indomitable spirit. 

She was always cooking and entertaining, welcoming people into her home, piling more food on their plates and filling their glasses. Sometimes, we would see her sleeping at the table and if she caught one us looking at her, she would say, "I'm just resting my eyes." When I look at old pictures of her now, I can see the dark rings under her eyes and how tired she looked, probably from the chemo. I can look back on it now and see that, had it not been for Uncle Joe helping my grandmother, our world would have been much different.

But as generous as he was, Uncle Joe also had very fixed ideas about what was right and what was wrong and how things should be done. So, for instance, during the week, he often cooked for his parents and his brothers. After he cooked, he would label each meal as either "Monday," "Tuesday," "Wednesday" and so on. It was a running joke in our family that if his brother, Al, wanted to annoy him, he would eat Tuesday's meal on Monday or eat Wednesday's meal on Tuesday.

My grandparents would tease Uncle Joe about this, but he would really get seriously upset if the meals were eaten out of order. Looking back on it now, I think that, for him, having that kind of rigid order helped him to feel secure: In a crazy world where, as a young man, you might suddenly find yourself one day in a foreign country killing other young men that you didn't even know, these simple things were things that you could count on. I think it represented stability and security to him, just like going to the same Mass every Sunday (9 AM and never 10 AM or 11 AM) or leaving for work at the post office at the same exact time every day.

He also never left the security of my grandparent's home. My grandfather died a year after my grandmother died, and my Uncle Joe died from a sudden heart a year after that. For someone who needed so much for things to remain the same, I can't help thinking that, aside from a history of heart problems among the men on my father's side of the family, my Uncle Joe also died in part because he couldn't tolerate that his world was turned upside down after my grandparents died. He was bereft without them.

I think that, for my Uncle Joe, who needed desperately for things to remain the same, he feared change. Change meant that the rug could be pulled out from underneath him at any time. He came back from the war during a time when no one really knew about post-traumatic stress disorder. They called it being "shell shocked" and there was no real treatment for it, not like there is today with the advent of EMDR and other forms of therapy that are specifically for trauma.

Fear and Clinging to Rigid Beliefs:
Reading Faith and remembering my Uncle Joe, and other people that I've known in my life, reminds me to have empathy and compassion for people who cling to their beliefs and who might be disparaging of others who hold different beliefs. When people need to cling to their beliefs and denigrate others, underneath it all, they're afraid. They might not even realize that they're afraid, but fear can be a powerful emotion. Fear can motivate us to change or it can make us run or it can freeze us in our tracks into stultifying rigidity.

If you find that you're "gazing at the sky through a straw," you might ask yourself whether fear might be keeping you from living more fully with more openness and flexibility. Trauma often causes people to feel fearful and avoidant. Trauma comes in many forms, not just the type of post-traumatic stress that we usually associate with war.

Getting Help in Therapy
If you feel stuck because of fear and insecurity, you're not alone, and you could benefit from seeing a licensed psychotherapist who has expertise in this area.

About Me
I am a licensed New York City psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist. 

I work with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Being in the Present Moment

Most of us tend to lead such busy lives that we're either focused on the past or projecting our thoughts into the future, often losing sight of the present moment. When our focus is either primarily on the past or in the future, so much of what is going on in the present can pass us by. This often robs our lives of meaning and can lead to unnecessary worry and rumination.

Being in the Present Moment

How Can We Learn to be in the Present Moment?
For many people, learning to be in the present moment can be a challenge. Unfortunately, most of us are not taught this skill as children, especially if we're raised in a household that is very goal oriented. When the focus is almost exclusively goal oriented, the emphasis tends to be on "the next thing" rather than on the present.

While there are certainly advantages to having goals in term of giving our lives direction, if we only focus on goals, we're often robbed of what's meaningful and rich in the present moment. Conversely, if our focus is primarily on the past, beyond learning from our experiences and understanding how we arrived at our current circumstances, we can get stuck and paralyzed looking backwards.

Start with Small Steps
When we're learning to make fundamental changes, we can start by taking small steps. So, this might mean taking breaks in the middle of our day, finding a quiet and private moment, closing our eyes and focusing on our breath. You don't need to know how to do any special breathing exercises. Just the act of focusing on your breath can slow down your heart rate and help you to relax.

While you're focusing on your breath, you can notice the quality of the air coming through your nostrils, whether the air feels cool or warm, dry or moist, how it feels as you take air into your lungs and feel your lungs expanding. Then, as you exhale, feeling all the stress and strain of the day leaving your body. Breathe normally and focus on whatever sensations you feel in your body.

In this way, you develop a mindful approach towards de-stressing and learning to be in the present moment. This might only take a few minutes, if that's all the time that you have or, if you can do this in a more leisurely manner, you might take more time.

Usually, you're likely to find that just the act of noticing your breath can be relaxing and refreshing. The challenging part is remembering to do it so you can do it on a regular basis.

Attending a yoga class, if you're able, can also be a wonderful way to be in the moment. As your yoga teacher gives you instructions about the poses, you're very focused on following his or her instructions, including the precise placement of your body in the pose. Usually, whatever you might have been worrying about before yoga class no longer preoccupies your mind because you're very focused on the yoga poses and the coordinated breathing that goes with the pose. Afterwards, most people feel relaxed and have an overall sense of well being.

If you think you might like to learn to meditate and you're new to meditation, you can get CDs that appeal to you with guided meditations. You might find that you have "monkey mind," a tendency for your thoughts to wander from one topic to the next, similar to a monkey jumping from one tree top branch to the next. But that's okay. As each thought comes into your mind, you can notice it and just let it go, like clouds that are passing in the sky.

Getting out into nature and really noticing the sights, sounds, and scents around you can also be a wonderful way to be in the present moment. This doesn't require any special skills. You just need to be present and take in what's around you.

People who know how to be in the present moment usually discover that when they return to whatever task or issue that they were concerned about before, they come back to it refreshed and much more creative than if they just continued to plod on.

As a psychotherapist in NYC, I encourage my clients to develop both internal and external resources, including being able to visualize in their mind's eye a safe or relaxing place. If they can't visualize a safe or relaxing place, I encourage them to think about a person, pet, symbol, spiritual being (if this has meaning for them) that gives them comfort and use that in their visualization.

Each of us can learn to develop our own preferred way to be in the present moment and, in doing so, discover a sense of contentment and gratitude.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.

I work with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me,

Reclaiming Your Creativity

Many clients have come to see me over the years in my psychotherapy private practice in New York City to overcome creative psychological blocks.  

These include writers, actors, artists, singers, and other people in the creative fields.  Often, the psychotherapy work involves reclaiming a creative aspect of themselves.

Reclaiming Your Creativity

What Does "Reclaiming Your Creativity" Mean?
The following vignette, which is a composite of many psychotherapy cases to protect confidentiality, is an example of a creative psychological block and how this client was able to reclaim his creativity:

John:
John, who is in his late 30s, is a short story writer.  At the point when he came to see me, he was struggling to complete a book of his short stories.  Every time he sat down at his computer to work on his stories, he was plagued by crushing self doubt.   He would stare at the computer screen for a long time while thoughts swirled around his head, "Who do you think you are, trying to write stories?," "No one's interested in what you have to say," "You can't write" and so on.  After a while, John would walk away from his work, pace around the room, and distract himself with something else before he went back to his writing to try again.

When John came to see me, this pattern was going on for months.  He was feeling more and more anxious and frustrated, and he feared he would never be able to write again.  Accomplished writers that John respected had looked over his work, and they encouraged him to complete the book.  But John was stuck.  He couldn't stop the critical voices in his head long enough to do any more work.

After several sessions of obtaining his personal history, which included an overly critical father who denigrated John's writing as a child, we used a combination of clinical hypnosis and Somatic Experiencing techniques to help John overcome the negative thoughts that kept him creatively blocked. The work wasn't easy for John because there were layers of trauma where John's father shamed him mercilessly.  But over time, John learned to overcome his negative thoughts so they no longer defeated him.  He also developed more confidence and he eventually completed his book and went on to other creative endeavors.

Psychological Blocks Can Occur in Any Endeavor
You don't have to be a writer or an artist to struggle with your creativity.  We all use our creativity every day to come up with ideas and solve problems in our lives.  Self doubt can be just as stifling no matter what you do, draining away your self confidence.  Often, these critical thoughts have their origins in childhood, and as a adults we re-experience them in the form of psychological blocks:

• the singer whose voice closes up on her when she goes for an audition
• the office manager who feels like he's about to choke, literally, when he has to give a presentation at work
• the supervisor who has been asked to come up with a solution to a work problem who feels like she's in a mental fog whenever she and her boss talk about the problem
• the job applicant who suddenly can't think of his accomplishments when the interviewer asks him about them
• the broadcast journalist whose presentation is fine--except when she goes on air and she stammers through the broadcast

A Psychological Block to a Solving an Office Problem

Psychological Blocks Can Be Overcome with Clinical Hypnosis and Somatic Experiencing
Psychological blocks can be overcome with a combination of clinical hypnosis and Somatic Experiencing.  

No two clinical cases are alike and there's no way to say in advance how the problem will be resolved.  

Much will depend on the individual's personal history, the type of problem, if there is trauma involved, and how the individual processes in treatment.  

For some people, the problem can be resolved in a matter of months, and for other people it might take longer.  But, generally speaking, I've found the combination of clinical hypnosis and Somatic Experiencing to be much more effective than just regular talk therapy.

About Me
I am a licensed New York psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist. 

I work with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.



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photo credit: miguelavg via photopin cc
photo credit: drewleavy via photopin cc