The Power of appreciation

I know, I know… I DO know that it is a cliché and I hate writing about what everyone already knows. But this time, I would like to write about the power of appreciation. Well, it’s Thanksgiving weekend, so it may be good timing.

Seriously speaking, your life can instantly become much better once you start to consciously appreciate what you have got in your daily life. It may sound cheesy, and I know it does, however, it is just really true. People who disbelieve what I am writing about here are unlikely to have tried it yet. Therefore, I would say just try it for 3 days, then complain to me if it didn’t do anything for you.

What to do? It’s super-simple. Intentionally try to find anything you can feel grateful for in your daily life. Any tiny thing you can find. Just pay attention to such minute stuff and experience genuine gratitude toward it for a few moments. We are naturally so inclined to think of and complain about what we don’t have or small things that irritate us, that it actually requires a little conscious effort to think of the good things we do have.

For example, you had a sound sleep, the sun is shining in your window, a bird is visiting your yard, breakfast was tasty, your spouse kissed you, traffic was better, a coworker greeted you with a nice smile, you were able to concentrate on your work in the morning, a waiter was nice to you, the toilet smelled nicer, etc. etc…Anything! Just focus on things you can appreciate, and be grateful. So simple, but we usually don’t do as much as we could.

One warning is that I am not encouraging you to force yourself to feel grateful for something when in fact you don’t actually feel that way. As I wrote before, we don’t want to fake or force our emotions in any way. If you hate your customer who unreasonably complained about your service, for example, you don’t want to appreciate her or the experience at all. That’s not what I am talking about. At the same time, however, you can still thank your colleague who supported you and/or your patience which helped you handle the situation professionally. That’s genuine gratitude and that works.

Again, I am talking about such a very simple concept today but I do feel you can get a lot of benefit from it, and I just cannot help talking about it today. Seriously, just give it a shot, as if it’s a game even if that what it takes to get you going. Let’s see what you experience after this.

Have fun!

Holidays: Are they a tough time for you?

   

It’s kinda unbelievable but it is already Halloween, almost the end of the year! How are you guys feeling about it? For me even, it’s feeling somewhat scary how quickly time flies. I still remember our fun New Year’s Eve Party, and now this year is almost over… Really!?!?

Well, around this time of year, there’s no way we ignore the fact that…"The Holidays” are right around the corner. Do you like the holiday season? If so, you are one of the lucky ones. As a psychologist, unfortunately, I am more concerned about people’s well-being around this time. Why is that? Because the holidays are quite a depressing time of the year for many, believe it or not. I want to talk about it today.

Many people actually feel worse around this time of the year. When you think about it, it is not so surprising. There are probably only a few lucky people who genuinely love this time, while many others have a tough time of it. Let’s see… If you are single with no family around, you may not have anything to do or anyone to be with on the holidays. Friends or coworkers may invite you to join their families for their holiday celebrations, but some may feel bad about that. You may feel pitied, or it’s just a reminder of your not having your own family, and then you may feel lonely after saying good night to them.  On top of it all, to spend the holidays with a nice enough family, you may end up spending a lot of time in a car or airport traveling at the busiest time of the year.

If you have your own family, you may have things to do, which is good, but then you may have to worry about some family drama, such as dealing with your mean auntie Mary or drunk uncle Joe who always makes your family feel uncomfortable. Perhaps you don’t even feel that close to your family, but succumb to the pressure of obligations. As the host, you may need to spend a lot of time and energy cooking and cleaning while your guests relax, on top of it all also spending a good amount of money. There always can be some family drama, but you are pretending everything is alright and everyone is having fun...

Even if you spend the time alone just with your partner or spouse with less demands, you may still feel too detached or isolated. You wonder why you are not with more family members and/or friends, feeling lonely and isolated from society/community.

Others are facing the first holiday season since a loved-one passed away, reminding them of their loss all over again, trying to cope with the empty seat at the dinner table.

Gosh, then who is really happy over the holidays!?!? Is it only some Pollyannaish kind of people or a lucky few? Well, actually almost everyone can be rather happy over the holiday season, but it requires a little shift in your mind.

One of the possible reasons why it is so tough is that we are in a way pressured to feel happy over the holidays and pressured to spend them in a certain way. “It’s a holiday, everyone MUST have somewhere to go and something to do, and be a happy family TOGETHER. That’s how it is SUPPOSED to be and it should be a happy time!” This almost mantra-like curse imposes a lot of pressure on people to meet unrealistic expectations! When we are pressured to feel and behave in a certain way, it becomes just that much harder to feel happy about it. So, this pressure makes it very difficult.

Another possible reason is that we tend to pay attention to what we lack, and ignore the privileges we have. If you are single and alone, you can actually enjoy the time off work having a nice relaxing time with no drama, which is not bad at all. You are free and you can enjoy NetFlix or barhopping or both! If you have a family, you can appreciate having someone to share some time together with, even if it includes some drama. It’s only a few times of the year anyway. If you have only your spouse or partner, it can be so nice to simply share your time off with your loved one with no distractions. It can be romantic, if you wish so. As long as we are alive, have a roof over our heads and food, and can take extra days-off work, that’s already a big “YAY!”

So first, just let go of the pressure to feel happy. You may feel it bothersome, annoying, time-consuming, and/or expensive, then just accept it as it is and bitch about it as needed. Once you are okay with not forcing yourself to feel happy or behave happily, you can appreciate what you really have, while not comparing yourself with others unnecessarily. Now you may feel calmer and more content. Then you can finally relax and enjoy your own special holidays in your own way!

*Have you thought about the people who have to work on holidays? Yes, it sucks (I have and still do as needed to take care of my patients, by the way), but you can always use the same principles. You can let go of the pressure about the holiday, and just appreciate that you have work and income. Also, hopefully you have some extra pay around this time, as well. That’s so nice and you can take some time off sooner or later, too. That’s enough, isn’t it? Why not!? Holidays are just one of the ordinary days which have just got some names!

Yes…, BUT…

What I am talking about here today is a communication strategy that most of us experience and/or use. We frequently acknowledge, conform with, and/or appreciate something that we hear, but then in reply we say "Yes, but..." to assert a different opinion, sometimes completely contradicting what we acknowledged with our "Yes. I'm sure you have experienced this kind of communication from others, or you do it to others, or both. I think this is a very common communication strategy many people use on a regular base. Yes, there is some benefit to it, BUT there are potential downsides of this strategies (<- Did you notice that I just used it!?).

We feel this “Yes…, BUT…” approach has a positive effect by making our opinion sound a little softer. It usually goes, for example, "I understand your point, BUT…" or, "Thank you very much for this, BUT…." or something like that. In this manner, we don’t sound like jerks who just make complaints or oppose everything. Basically, we don't want to just disagree with our loved ones or coworkers, so we show our understanding first. After that, we then want to voice our contradictory opinions... A very considerate and nice strategy, isn’t it?

The potential problem with this approach, however, is that this may no longer work as much as it used to, if it ever did. Personally, I try to not to use "Yes..., But..." because I don't like it when people do it to me. I find myself just paying attention to whatever comes after the “BUT” and it sometimes even makes me feel upset to have heard those sugarcoated but insincere words that came before it. It may be just meant to please me or not to upset me, but that annoys me…do you feel this way too?

Actually, people frequently pay attention only to what comes after the "But" part. We know that whatever we heard before the "But" means nothing, even when both sides of the argument are supposedly being acknowledged. More sadly, people sometimes just automatically expect to hear the "But…" part. In my personal experience, when I have complimented my supervisees on something they did that impressed me, I sometimes feel that they are waiting for  the “But” part to follow.

So what can we do to get around this communication technique? How can we handle it better?

First, I want to emphasize that nothing is wrong if you continue using this verbal technique. It may be, however, more helpful if you are more aware that people may be so used to it that they discard what you say in acknowledging their opinion and just hear the “But…” part. With a conscious effort you can intentionally modify your tone or emphasis so that you can communicate more effectively without saying "But..."

Second, you can change the expression a little so as to avoid using, “BUT.” I sometimes say, "Yes…at the same time..."  "I get it… hmm...What about...?" "I see your point. By the way…” and so on.

Once we eliminate “BUT” from the sentence, the nuance can sound better, although “but” may be more logically or grammatically correct. As I discussed in my article about the purpose of communication, being accurate is not the point of human communication: delivering what you want to convey is the most important thing. Thus, if avoiding “BUT” works better in terms of effective communication, we can and should avoid it. Why not?

Today, I talked about a very commonly used communication strategy and its drawbacks. The more awareness you have about how you are communicating, the better your communication becomes! Let’s be curious and sensitive to what we say and hear in our daily lives so as to become better communicators!

*This is a "BUTT"

Emotions... Stop dismissing them

Emotions… Not only we psychotherapists, but also many people emphasize their importance. Yes, they are very important and they are actually one of the main focuses of psychotherapy. But why are they considered that important? Surprisingly, a good number of people, even therapists, have difficulty answering that question. Today, I would like to talk about emotions.

Actually, emotions are one of the most fundamental elements of human beings and human life. When we were born, all we had were “comfortable” or “uncomfortable,” “happy” or “unhappy,” or something like that. That was about it, right? And once we leave infancy behind, emotions become a more primary part of our lives, and an essential part of our brain that influences us a lot, even more than what we would wish for sometimes.

We also usually feel “alive” when we have emotions: Think about the many things you like to do, the pieces of art or entertainments you enjoy. Even roller coasters and horror movies! They invoke some kind of emotion in us, and that’s why we care about them. If we had to lead lives where we experienced no emotions, that would be a really dry and empty existence.

Yes, emotions are vital for our lives and a very important part of them. At the same time, however, emotions are considered problematic in many situations. A lot of people are afraid of expressing emotions or try to avoid them because they are so powerful that you cannot control them in a manner you wish. They can be overwhelming, heart-breaking, or something that drives you crazy, and so on.

Because of emotions, people feel “hurt,” “depressed,” “angry,” “lonely,” “anxious,” and much more, often leaving us feeling powerless. However, we cannot just “turn it off,” leaving us feeling embarrassed by them, or losing control because of them…    

The important thing about emotions to know is that there are no “right” or “wrong” emotions. We often think this is a good/bad emotion to have. For example, it is not uncommon to hear that “It is wrong to feel this way,” “This emotion is inappropriate,” “It is bad to feel angry/sad/jealous,” or “I should feel happy about such a thing.” It’s totally understandable, but there is actually no good or bad about our emotions.

When it comes to emotions, however, once they’re there, they’re there. That’s the nature of emotions, and you cannot do anything about it other than to just acknowledge and accept it. This is a fundamental truth. Once you feel a certain way about something, then nobody or nothing (including yourself!) can deny or remove those feelings. It is very common for people not to approve their feelings: “Oh, she is saying this for my benefit, so I should not feel angry about it,” “I should not feel sad because others will be disappointed,” “It is inappropriate if I feel jealous of him,” or “I have a good family, so I should not feel depressed.” But again, once it’s there, it is there. If you deny your feelings, that means you are denying yourself, your being, your existence, actually, and it will get back to you eventually.

Most of us are trained not to acknowledge, accept, or express our emotions as we get older. In order to cope with social requirements, we may sometimes regulate our emotional expressions or behaviors. However, this does not mean we cannot feel them or make some feelings to be wrong. This is really crucial and I hope all of you can embrace your own emotions, because they are precious!

Good Eye Contact

Having good eye contact is considered very important in the culture of the West. Although there are some situations where eye contact is not required much, in other situations, such as job interviews, it is very critical to have good eye contact. The problem is that not everyone is comfortable with making  and maintaining eye contact. So, let's talk about eye contact today and I will give some tips for those of you who might benefit from this advice.

Eye contact is actually cultural behavior. In some cultures, such as Japan where I am from, having strong eye contact may be considered too much or even "rude." No surprise that people have much less eye contact in these cultures. Naturally, for people from such backgrounds, making good eye contact may be difficult.

In the United States, people are expected to make good eye contact out of courtesy and/or professionalism. This doesn’t mean, however, that all of Americans, even those born and raised here, find eye contact easy.

Anxiety in social situations, known as “Social Anxiety,” is pretty common for many people. Even if some people may have little anxiety in general, it may still be quite challenging in more serious, anxiety-provoking situations such as job interviews or presentation.


So what can you do for it? Well, you can practice eye contact with your friends and/or life coach or someone you trust to help you get used to making eye contact. Or, you can see a psychologist to understand what makes it so difficult for you and practice to overcome your difficulties. If you don’t like those options, let me share a couple of tips here with you.

1) Try eyeglasses. This is really interesting but very helpful, actually. If you wear eyeglasses, you can feel like you have a shield between you and the other person. If you already wear glasses, or if this trick didn’t seem to work for you, try ones with some small amount of tint on them. They still look appropriate and you feel less anxious. You may be surprised how much more at ease you feel once you put them on!

2) If eyeglasses did not work, or if you don't like the idea of hiding your lovely face or something like that, here is another strategy. Try to look at the person's mouth or philtrum, the area between mouth and nose, instead of the eyes; you can look at this area with it not being noticeable that you are doing so. You can try taking a look at the eyes of the person you are talking to at times when you can to gradually get used to maintaining actual eye contact. Even though it may not be perfect eye contact, people won’t notice. It’s much better than talking to somewhere without any apparent eye contact, and your anxiety will be much less.


Once you are used to doing the above, eventually you are likely to feel okay with having more and more direct eye contact. Eye contact has a strong power, and may even feel too much for some people at time. But once you can utilize it, you can take advantage of this power for your benefit, such as making a better impression, demonstrating a stronger presence, being more confident and persuasive, and even appearing more attractive! Keep practicing it until you feel comfortable. The more you do, the less difficult it is. Have fun and every success!