Day 33 Positive Changes

Have you noticed any positive changes in your life since you have started this program?

Two things really stick out for me on this question.

One is that I'm now able to identify and feel when I'm stressed. Prior to all of this, I never really thought of myself as someone who was stressed. People would even tell me "you never seem to stress." I can now see that I was almost always in some state of stress. It was my normal way of functioning and I actually felt weird when I wasn't stressed. One of my big ways of handling it was by staying busy. I was always the person who couldn't relax and needed to be doing something. Better to stay busy than to sit with my own thoughts! Now I can feel the difference and can actually recognize what it's like to be relaxed. That is a big improvement for me.

Secondly, I'm learning to show myself some compassion and it's wonderful. My inner critic is not as harsh and I now find myself just talking to myself and saying things like good job, way to go, etc. I'm trying to handle situations with myself the way I would with my six and four year old. I'd never talk to them the way I talked to myself. So this has also been a big change for me and one that I'm glad I found.

 

Hah, this is the worst! I knew this wasn't true at age 22, but had no clue what to do about it until I discovered Dr Sarno (and Claire Weekes, among others) 40 years later! Good job getting on top of this much earlier in your life, Hooray!

 

Hi @ruddybarron
Thanks for your message, a lot of people (before my burnouts at work) told me also "are you stressed, really ?, you look so calm !". I also have this internal need to always do something.. but I cannot say at all this is past.
Your post inspires me anyway !

 

@ChronicVince I'm glad someone can relate and find the post helpful. Keep doing the program and working at it. I wish it was as simple as doing the program and being completely healed but for most of us this has been building for years and become a part of who we are. This time last year I was on my way to rock bottom. It took me six months from there to start to feel just a tiny bit better and have a little bit of hope that I could get to a better place. But every month after that I noticed positive changes as I was doing the work. Here we are just past the one year mark and I can finally say I'm in a much better place. It took me one whole year to finally be able to say I'm feeling good. And I still have my challenges and things I'm working through but I now feel much more confident that I can handle it.

I truly believe that if we keep working at it things will start to improve. They may be gradual and happen very slowly but one day you start to notice that things are better and that gives you hope and you can keep building from there. Keep up the good work!

 

Ho thanks for this answer. I don't know why I assumed you were there just by doing 35 days of this program. Indeed, like me, you had other works before and afterwards probably!