Terri O'Reilly
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WHY DO I FEEL SO BROKEN? IT'S A 4 STEP PROCESS TO REPAIR!
Feeling flat, upset, sad or demotivated from time to time are normal human states of being. Life can sometimes produce challenging moments that can make it difficult to cope. We can’t expect calm waters all of the time. However, if you are asking yourself why you feel so broken psychologically or emotionally, that’s a little more than a normal state and you need to take immediate action.
Act as soon as you possibly can because feeling this way is not only uncomfortable on a day-to-day basis but there are also potential serious health implications. Poor psychological health, such as depression has been linked to a 67% increased risk of death from heart disease and a 50% increased risk of death from cancer. Likewise, stress is linked to increased risk of coronary disease, reduced immune system functioning, muscle pain, headaches, respiratory problems and endocrine, gastrointestinal and nervous system issues.
If you’re asking yourself: why do I feel so broken, make a commitment to take the first step to restoration now. Here’s how…
Step 1 – Check the physical
The most important thing to start with is a visit to your doctor to rule out any biological drivers such as physical disease or conditions like anxiety or depression. If your physical health turns out all G, then it’s time to consider that your thought or decision making processes may need some tweaking.
Step 2 – Change what can be changed
Do a critical analysis of your life and determine what areas, if any, are deficient and making you feel broken. If something isn’t working in your life, maybe it’s not so much about changing thought processes but about changing things on a practical level.
For example; if your relationship is causing you stress, maybe you either need to change it or discard it altogether. Likewise, we don’t stay friends with those that cause problems for us, and we would look to leave a job if it’s not the right place for us to be.
Sometimes changing the practical things can be difficult, or you may have conflicting thoughts about whether or not to keep it, change it or discard it altogether. If you can’t reach a firm conclusion on your own, or you’re finding it difficult to reach a solution that is the best one for you, enlist the help of an outside professional like a therapist who can explore the situation with you.
Step 3 – Who are you?
If your physical health is on point and you’ve changed any problematic drivers you’ve identified, then the next step is to look at your thinking processes.
Your thinking style maybe the very thing that’s creating you internal or external conflict. Perhaps you’ve always had the same thinking style, or perhaps it’s recently changed which has brought on the discomfort. No matter if it’s old or new patterns, it’s not working for you and now’s the time to make the commitment to change.
Human beings have an inestimable capacity for change. We are constantly evolving. Each day we take on new thoughts and ideas, often unaware. Transforming our cognitive process isn’t as difficult as you might think.
Step 4 – Defuse
We sometimes become fused, stuck, enmeshed or invested in what others say, think or do. We can become easily hurt by things perceived as insults, or upset when we rate the behaviours of others as unfair or uncaring. We make judgements about the world and others, and we assume our judgements are correct. We expect others to behaviour to our standards and become annoyed when they don’t. We believe that others should be able to mind-read and therefore give us what we want and need. We expect people will always take our needs into account and we get disgruntled when they don’t or they perceive our needs incorrectly. In a romantic partnership, some will criticise or punish a partner who doesn’t communicate enough or who is seen to not be caring enough.
We can also do the same things with our internal thoughts and these are all the things that result is feelings of brokenness.
A way to shed the brokenness is to defuse from your uncomfortable thoughts, judgements, expectations and perceptions of yourself and others. The more we hold onto them, the more power they have over us. If we image letting go and dropping the investment, the power they have over us diminishes.
Try these defusion exercises:
You’re angry by something someone at work said to you. There’s nothing you need to do to address the issue in a practical sense. You don’t work with this person usually and don’t see them very often. You know you need to let the comment go but you still feel angry.
Take a moment to sit and imagine you are in the middle of a dance floor and you are engaging with your anger. You know there’s no point in continuing to do this. When you continue to engage, the anger continues to have power over you. Imagine leaving the dancefloor and saying to yourself, “I’m just not going to dance with this anymore”. Imagine walking away and letting the feelings go.
Or…
Imagine you’re sitting underneath a tree beside a beautiful stream. You can hear the wind caressing the leaves on the tree, the water tinkling by you, perhaps you can hear the occasional fish splash up out of the stream.
A leaf falls down onto your lap and you imagine putting your anger on the leaf. You then place the leaf on the stream and allow it to slowly float by… your anger floating further and further down the stream until it’s out of sight altogether.