Mindful ISTDP

During the hustle and bustle of the holidays, it can be difficult to prioritize ourselves, especially as therapists. As you hold space for your patients, want to share a few ways you can build resiliency in yourself to have a healthy and satisfying end of this year as you start the next. Noticing your anxiety, rather than ignoring it will help you feel more connected and prevent burn out. As you prepare for busy days, try to create moments of slowness to connect with your body. Pay attention to physical signs of anxiety, and help yourself soften as you breathe. This reset can help you re-enter a party, work, or travel from a more intentional headspace. Stop to ask yourself, “What do I really want for myself this holiday season?” With so many external demands during the holidays, stopping to think about how you want to spend your time can give you more control to create the experiences you want. Once you have a picture of your wishes, what are actions you can take between now and then to help them come to life? Spend some time in a group. Connecting with others can be healing for our nervous system. Some ways to connect socially could be: getting a group of friends together, attending an exercise or yoga class, learning a new skill, volunteering, joining a faith-based group, or finding a public event near you. If social groups tend to increase your anxiety, try joining one that doesn't require as much verbal interaction. Consider what rituals and traditions you want to keep, change, or create new for yourself this year. What would make the holiday season meaningful for you? What food, activities, clothes, decorations, music, or conversations are important to include this year? Share your ideas with your loved ones and invite them to participate with you. Keeping to healthy rhythms and routines is stress-reducing. It is normal for our schedules to shift to accommodate new plans and time off, but ensuring that some parts of your typical schedule are prioritized will help you to feel your best, like ensuring you get enough sleep, planning time for exercise, and eating nourishing meals.

Do you want to learn how to become a more effective therapist in the new year? Join us for a free, 1-hour Introduction to Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy held over Zoom, which provides you 1 free CEU! Register: https://hubs.li/Q03015cx0

Most therapists are trained in suicide risk assessment and safety planning - but what about addressing the root cause of what is driving this problem? Join us at this training a to gain a deeper understanding of suicidal ideation and how to treat it. Register here: https://hubs.li/Q02ZHX1n0

Mindful ISTDP's next 3-day Pre-Core Training in Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy has been scheduled! Learn more and register at https://hubs.ly/Q02ZJzvx0.

This training will give you effective tools for working with suicide crisis through the lens of Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy (ISTDP). Powerful internal forces drive a self-destructive urge and equally powerful interventions are needed to treat it. We will address the elements for intervening at the root cause of the suicidal impulse to eliminate it. Register here: https://hubs.li/Q02ZHVlN0

Getting together with loved ones during the holiday is sure to stir up many feelings in our clients and ourselves. This time of year, we are often visiting places and people we haven’t seen in some time. This can remind us of painful memories and create opportunities for conflict. Naturally, this could generate mixed feelings of anger, love, guilt, grief, and joy. These strong mixed feelings can create anxiety, and anxiety wants us to go away from our uncomfortable feelings. We all use lots of ways to soothe ourselves when we’re anxious, and around the holidays, one way can be eating. This is completely normal to reach for comfort food when we are anxious. If you have a client finding that overeating is an issue for them, help them notice their anxiety creating an impulse to reach for food (or other things). When they notice this impulse, invite them to take a moment to observe their body. What kinds of sensations do they notice? What feelings just got stirred up, and toward whom? Encourage them to be kind to themselves as they make space to process this information from their feelings. As they notice anxiety coming down – check back in with the impulse. Do they still want that piece of pie? If so, enjoy it! Paying close, loving attention to ourselves gives us more options that feel good to us and our bodies.

This self-compassion workshop will help you be good to yourself as difficult and painful feelings are surfacing about the election and holiday season. Learn how to process these feelings about these stressors in a way that centers and cares for you. You can register here: https://hubs.li/Q02XYfrQ0 Please email any questions to programs@mindfulistdp.com

This election is causing anxiety in most of us, and we as therapists are not immune. Ruminating on these stressful events or venting with others can feel like you’re helping yourself process in the moment, however these behaviors can actually make our anxiety worse. Anxiety creates uncomfortable sensations in the body including muscle tension, headaches, stomach sickness, dizziness, lightheadedness, and can even lead to chronic pain. If you recognize this in yourself, or if you recognize this in your clients, it can be helpful to take some time to get to know your feelings under your anxiety, and to help your clients do the same. When painful things are happening outside of our control, facing feelings toward what has happened will bring our anxiety down. As you spend this time with yourself, you may feel a number of feelings like grief, joy, anger, love, healthy guilt, or healthy shame at the same time. Slowly approach each feeling. How do you experience this inside your body? What information does this feeling give you to help you be good to yourself in the face of this painful and stressful election?

It can be hard to prioritize self-care in the final months of the year. Put this workshop on your calendar now as a present to yourself to invest in your wellness! You can register here: https://hubs.li/Q02Whtqk0 Please email questions to programs@mindfulistdp.com

Join us for this ISTDP-informed approach to addressing implicit bias in your clinical work. This training meets the Implicit Bias requirement for license renewal. You can register here: https://hubs.li/Q02SnVlW0