Building Inner Resilience in Stressful Times

EPISODE 50 | BUILDING INNER RESILIENCE IN STRESSFUL TIMES

And when we are in survival mode – I mean, we were not concerned about being authentic, let alone being about our best selves. I mean, forget about all that, right? We need to survive.

[00:00:15] INTRODUCTION
Welcome to Becoming Me, your podcast companion and coach in your journey to a more integrated and authentic self. I am your host, Ann Yeong, and I'm here to help you grow in self-discovery and wholeness. If you long to live a more authentic and integrated life and would like to hear honest insights about the rewards and challenges of this journey, then take a deep breath, relax, and listen on to Becoming Me.

[00:00:49]
Hello again, dear listeners! Today, I would like to talk about interior or inner resilience in stressful times. If you remember, way back at the start of Becoming Me – actually episodes four and five – when I talked about living from the inside out.

[00:01:15]
I talked about how fundamental and how foundational it is, this principle that we want to be able to live from a place that is deep and anchored and grounded enough within us, so that with all the challenges and difficulties that we present in our lives, whatever adversity we may have to face, we can navigate life with greater grace and ease, than if we weren't firmly anchored. There are a lot of things in life that are not within our control.

[00:01:58]
And there are many, many very big challenges. For example, I mean, the pandemic that we have been in the last, you know, coming three years, the war that has broken out in Europe and Ukraine, just these past few weeks at the time of this recording. And many other things seemingly on a smaller, more personal scale – maybe not on the global scale, but in our lives, we each have to face sometimes tragedy, unexpected things that, you know, feels like it's pulling the rug from beneath our feet.

[00:02:40]
When someone that we love – a parent, a spouse, a child – falls very ill, you know, we lose our job or we get completely disillusioned and betrayed by someone that we trust, or an institution that we trust. I mean, there's just so many, so many stresses, right – that that can feel like it's trying to pull us out from being authentic and real and loving.

[00:03:18] WHAT IS "RESILIENCE"?
So, when we talk about resilience or when people talk about resilience, sometimes we stop thinking that it's about being tough, right? About being strong, not crumbling under pressure or, you know, not giving up in times of stress and adversity. But I think it's so much more than that. And we need to be more nuanced in the way we think about resilience because – precisely because our society and culture tends to value and reward, like, you know, the strong ones, right?

[00:03:55]
Like the ones who don't break under pressure. So, there is a lot of – there's actually a lot of insecurity and fear that often comes out in the form of aggression and toughness, right. And in the short term, it may seem like this is what's good to keep us from breaking. But if this is not authentic, if this doesn't match a deeper reality, right – in each person's inner-self, their, their emotional reality, their mental reality –

[00:04:31]
– what's going to happen is at some point we're going to break. Things are going to break, right? We're going to get a mental breakdown. Our bodies may give way. And a lot of times, that's also why we end up having serious illnesses – because all that stress has to go somewhere.

[00:04:48]
And if we are not processing it, we are not acknowledging it, we're pretending that everything's okay, in order for us to remain "strong" – quote unquote – well, there's a saying that the body never lies, right. And in time, your body's going to tell you, actually you're not okay. We're not okay. We are not actually really coping well.

[00:05:09]
This is not really resilience, right. Again, of course being resilient doesn't mean that, you know, we don't get hurt and we don't get wounded and that, you know – that we don't get stressed. I think all that – all that is inevitable. But it's about, I think how – well, how integrated we can be in the way that we respond to all these stresses in a way that honours ourselves, as well as other people. How aware we can be in terms of whether our actions are coming from a place of truth, of kindness, of compassion, or whether it's really just about survival, which it often is – it's just about survival.

[00:05:56]
And it's every person for him or herself. And we end up not quite caring who we put down, who we hurt in order to, you know, remain okay for ourselves. Right, so, Becoming Me – I mean, this entire project, this entire podcast – is about each person becoming more fully alive, more, more fully ourselves. First and foremost, because each person is so precious and unique, and we deserve to be fully alive.

[00:06:38]
Okay, just by being human, that's actually what we're created for, right? And while there are many factors, sometimes threatening that and trying to make it impossible for us to really be ourselves, to be alive. That is still what we're called for. And I believe in this project. And which is why I share what I do to help each person, hopefully, find that will, find that desire to want to still live, you know – with passion, with conviction, even in the face of all of life's adversity.

[00:07:20]
Right, so, really Becoming Me is about resilience too. I mean, not only about resilience, but it's a part of that. But it's not just about ourselves. When we are fully alive, when we are clearer about who we are and what is uniquely ours to live and ours to offer – what our gifts are, what our life is about – we bless the world.

[00:07:47]
We bless the people around us. When we are more authentic and integrated when we can live with greater integrity. I mean, you know, our families, our spouses, our colleagues, the people in our lives – they are going to receive more compassion, more wisdom, more support, truth, right? That's not always going to feel good.

[00:08:13]
But our authenticity is going to call forth other people's authenticity. It may call out inauthenticity so, therefore people – sometimes people will not be happy with our authenticity, right. But in the larger scheme of things, we are actually calling forth the beauty and the truth in the world around us.

[00:08:36]
So, now, even in this time of war, right? I mean, with Russia invading Ukraine – I mean, it's so heart breaking. It's really hard for me even to follow the news sometimes. But in the midst of all the, you know – all the darkness, we also see great light in the moral courage that people have, the resilience of the Ukrainian people – for example.

[00:09:08]
I mean, how much spirited resistance they are giving and how – well, just how much courage they have, right? How much love they have for their country, for their people. I am also in awe of the moral courage of Russians who are openly protesting the war, speaking out against the war, you know – even at great risk to themselves.

[00:09:37]
When I look at these kind of stories, it makes me wonder about myself, right? It makes me wonder about myself. Do I have the same capacity inside me when it is required of me to have that kind of strength and resilience and integrity – moral integrity, moral courage – that I would risk my comfort, my security, you know, even my safety – even my life, perhaps, I mean – to really be true to what I believe.

[00:10:17] 3 FACTORS THAT AFFECT OUR RESILLIENCE
And so that's what led me also to think about how I can maybe pull the threads a little to make the connection for you, between the kinds of things that we talk about on Becoming Me, and resilience. Okay, so, I want to talk about three factors that can affect our resilience or our ability to have really the kind of interior resilience.

[00:10:46]
Okay, so, I want to say, I use the term "interior resilience" to emphasise that we're talking about in a very, very integrated kind of resilience from within, from inside out. Okay, so, three factors that can affect our resilience. The first factor would be – I'll say, our integration. Okay, or the degree in which we are already integrated.

[00:11:11] 1. HOW INTERGRATED WE ALREADY ARE
In other words, the degree in which we are healed from our own brokenness and fragmentation. So, a few episodes ago – before the series on inner child healing – there is an episode I talked about enlarging our capacity for authenticity. Right, and what I was trying to say in that episode is that we all desire to be more authentic, but there's a limit to our authenticity, right.

[00:11:40]
We bump up against the walls when we realized that I – this is it because maybe I'm not brave enough to be authentic in this situation. Or when I feel threatened by rejection, that that's when I hide again. Right, so, increasing or enlarging our capacity for authenticity is the work of integration, okay.

[00:12:03]
This healing work that we are doing – that we're interested in doing – it builds our capacity for authenticity. So, in the same way, the degree to which we are healed and integrated is also the degree to which we can truly be resilient in stressful times. Okay, because our integration – this is the foundation.

[00:12:25]
This is like the ground in which our roots grow. Okay, and the deeper our roots are into, you know, the core of ourselves, right – the clearer we are about who we are, the more able we are to be secure in the identity. The more grounded we are in our core identity and the more resilient we will be. The more our bodies, our minds, our emotions and soul are in harmony with one another, the more able we will be to tap into our inner resources in times of stress.

[00:13:00]
Why is that? See, when there are stresses in our life – okay, so, when there are some kind of threat, or maybe a perceived threat – we will all naturally feel some fear, you know? And there's usually some kind of – the immediate response will be disorientation, right?

[00:13:22]
But when our foundation is strong, 1. we will probably be less shaken by the environment or circumstantial situations that affect us. Yes, we will still be impacted, but if our roots are deep, our foundations are stable and strong, we will be less shaken by it. And we also will be more able – even when we are shaken – to return to that base point, okay.

[00:13:53]
To be able to remind ourselves or to remember; this is who I am. This is what I stand for. Yes – all this, you know, there's this new data for me to take in an environment that is stressful, a situation that is hugely stressful. But I can go back into – this is who I am, this is what I stand for.

[00:14:16]
And this is how I wish to respond. I can then have a stable base from which to then respond to the environmental situation – however stressful it may be. So, then that integration that I have will allow me to be more resilient, which means that then there's a higher chance that my response would be one that is authentic.

[00:14:42]
Okay, and because it is authentic, it will also carry with it, the quality of truth, right – and hopefully, of goodness. Okay, so, there's that first factor, right? So, our degree of integration affects our resilience.

[00:15:04] SELF-REGULATING WHEN WE ARE DYSREGULATED
The second point is related to it, but you know, a little different. And the second point I want to talk about – what can affect our resilience and stressful times is our ability to self-regulate when we are dysregulated.

[00:15:18]
Okay, so, what do I mean? I know these are kind of new terms to some of you. So, dysregulation is also kind of a – it's a technical term that's used in psychology and neurobiology to describe what happens to us, in our bodies, when we face situations or when we are in situations that threaten our safety.

[00:15:43]
Okay, so, it may not just be physical threat, which, you know, for example, if suddenly you find yourself staring into the eyes of a lion or a predator, okay. You are in physical danger, right? So, that's where your physical safety, your very life is at threats. What happens? I mean, we go into fight or flight or freeze mode, right?

[00:16:07]
I mean, it's an automatic response. You don't even – you don't need to intend it. You automatically – your body just kicks into gear, right? Now, the thing is it's not just physical danger that causes us to have all these physiological reactions. When we face psychological danger or emotional danger, right – when our safety, in any of this sense, is threatened, we get dysregulated.

[00:16:35]
Which means that we are no longer calm. We are no longer able to think clearly, right? I mean, we go into that fight, flight or freeze mode. There's another mode – another defensive kind of mode that has been coming up more in the literature – and that is "Fawn" mode. Fawn mode – like, you know, Bambi, right? A little deer.

[00:16:56]
And the fawn mode is when we then try to just play nice and placate others. You know, we go into people-pleasing mode as a way to protect ourselves. Right, so, all of these reactions – whether we suddenly find that we want to fight, we're very aggressive, or we want to just run away from the situation, flea – flight, right?

[00:17:15]
Or we just freeze. Or we just go into people-pleasing mode, you know, because we are afraid that we will be harmed if people get angry. We want to assure people that we are not a threat, basically. So, these are all reactions or ways that we automatically kind of – we go into when we feel that we're not safe.

[00:17:37]
So, when we are in these defensive stances, our only primary instinct is to survive. Okay, I mean, there's good reason because if you're in danger, I mean, first, you need to survive this danger, right? And when we are in survival mode – I mean, we were not concerned about being authentic, let alone being about our best selves.

[00:17:56]
I mean, forget about all that, right? We need to survive. Our baseline for getting triggered varies from person to person. And also, it varies according to the degree in which we have been integrated and healed. Right, so, those of us who have done, let's say, a lot more inner work in healing and integration –
[00:18:15]
– we may find that our baseline for being triggered would have shifted. You know, we may not be as easily triggered as we used to be. Whereas for those of us who are very early on the journey or have many wounds in our life history that has not been tended to – has not healed – we may find that we are very frequently and often triggered into being in a dysregulated state, okay.

[00:18:40]
And it may be so normal for us, we may not even realize that we're almost constantly in some form of trying to fight or flee or freezing or fawning – or just people pleasing, right – just to survive. We just want to try and survive.

[00:18:57]
A lot of our triggers come from our unhealed wounds. And the thing about this phenomenon of being triggered is, it usually comes from a memory of something that had happened a long time – maybe in our past. Very often when we were younger or more vulnerable, right. So, something had happened before that traumatized us, that hurt us. And our body remembers that. So, the next time we're in an environment where there are some similarities, somehow.

[00:19:29]
So, we consciously may not even recognize or be aware of it. But at a deeper level, right? Our bodies and the more primitive part of our brains – it detects certain patterns that reminds it of the wound that had happened, or the trauma that happened in the past. So, and we immediately go into that defensive stance – that dysregulation.

[00:19:55]
Even if in the current time, the actual reality is not at the level of the same danger as it used to be in the past. So, just for example, something that we experienced when we were four years old – as a four-year-old, we are very defenceless, right? And when we would have an experience where we were helpless and maybe we were hurt.

[00:20:14]
Now, let's say we're 40, right. And even if let's say we were in the face of a bully, somebody who is bullying, right – we can feel like that four-year-old, because this situation reminds us of how we were hurt. But actually, as a 40-year-old, we have a lot more resources than we did than when we were four years old. But in that moment, when we're triggered, it's like, we don't realize that we are not four years old, you know? So, our reaction actually can come from that very scared four-year-old, right?

[00:20:48]
So, this is related to that whole discussion that I had with Dr. Jean Cheng about inner child healing. This is why inner child healing can be so important. Because when we do – when we heal or reparent our inner child, we build our interior capacity to be able to mature, right – so, that we can remind ourselves that, hey, I'm actually not four years old.

[00:21:09]
I've done all this work. I have resources. I have my dignity. I have a voice. And I will not just, you know, stand there or sit there and just take being bullied, for example. Right, okay, but in that moment, when we are dysregulated, we may feel a lot more threatened than the reality actually warrants. And our perceived danger could be greatly, exaggerated.

[00:21:35]
Right, now, that's not saying that the fear isn't real. The fear that we feel is real, okay? It's really real. So, that's why it's so, so hard for us to come out of being dysregulated, right? Because when that fear is so real, what happens? We usually – we panic, and we react. Okay, so, we react instead of responding.

[00:21:59]
So, we react out of our fear, out of our panic. Even if we try to mask it by like, you know, appearing to be very in control. But actually inside, we're panicking, and we are fearful. And so, we are reacting instead of responding with calm conviction. There is a quote I just came across earlier today by Dr. Alison Cook.

[00:22:22]
"Sometimes, it can feel like you are trapped in your circumstances when really you are trapped inside the ways that you have been conditioned to respond to your circumstances". She's saying that, okay, we can feel trapped – and I think a lot of times when we panic, when we go into a fight, flight, freeze mode, et cetera, we feel trapped, right?

[00:22:47]
We feel like we have no way out. But actually, we may not actually be trapped in the circumstances. There could be actually avenues and ways that we can come out of it or that we can actually respond creatively, but we are trapped by our conditioning, right? Because all those years of learning that we have no choice or that this is the only way we can act in a certain way when we face this kind of situation, for example.

[00:23:13]
So, we have been conditioned to have a very limited number of responses to our circumstances. The work of healing and integration is to help us come out from that very limited number of choices that we have, okay. We discover our flexibility again, you know? It's like we discover – hey, there are different ways that I can move.

[00:23:35]
When we are not trapped in fear, then we find often that we have more creativity than we knew, you know? Creativity in knowing how to respond towards life, towards compassion, towards love – and not just shrinking out of fear. So, it is important for us to learn ways which we can help to regulate ourselves when we are triggered.

[00:24:00]
First of all, to even be aware when we're triggered and then to learn how to accompany ourselves back into a calmer space. Right, so, a big part of this is what we have been talking about in episodes, such as, you know, having a safe space or finding safe space for becoming or learning to be a safe space for ourselves, right?

[00:24:19]
Because it's about learning how to listen to ourselves, how to attune to our needs, our desires, to notice our fears without being afraid of these negative emotions that we may begin to acknowledge as rising insiders, you know? Because all of this then helps us to know that I have the resources.

[00:24:41]
I have the ability to deal with these things in a mature way, right. But we need to get there by learning how to accompany ourselves.

[00:24:51] AM I REACTING OR RESPONDING?
So, you may wonder how would, you know, if you are reacting or if you're responding to a situation, right? I mean, are you reacting out of panic, out of fear – or are you actually responding authentically? –

[00:25:05]
– Which is then also a mark of inner resilience. Well, the quality of your energy and the impact of your action will reveal it to you. Okay, so, the quality of the energy with which you act, and then the impact of your action will reveal to you if you are reacting or you're responding.

[00:25:28]
When we are reacting out of being dysregulated – okay, so, out of that space of, you know, fighting, or fleeing, or freezing, or fawning – we are fearful, right? And if you're able to just kind of like, tune into what's the emotion that you're feeling underneath your actions – it's not that difficult. If you can be honest that I'm fearful. And when we are fearful, a lot of times, the way we act may be expressed with more aggression than is necessary, with more force than is necessary.

[00:26:02]
Sometimes, the same words, for example, can be conveyed calmly, but may convey with a lot more force, right? Because well, we're threatened. So, we want to appear bigger than we are. It's natural, it's normal. And so, we can come across as aggressive – sometimes. That's especially if we are in fight mode, right?

[00:26:24]
Sometimes, you can tell that your reaction, instead of being aggressive, is very submissive, right? It's like you don't even want to put up any fight. You shrink back and you no longer have a voice. It's like someone, or the circumstances – someone else has effectively silenced you, right.

[00:26:43]
And you just want to please that person. So, that's like the energy you can notice, right? The energy of your action, of what you're doing or how you're responding. And the impact of our action on the people around us, okay – when we are reacting out of this space of defensiveness, it's usually then we would be shutting people down, right.

[00:27:07]
We'll be shutting them down. We'll be maybe belittling them or, you know, we just want them to stop. Right, so, it can be by trying to overpower them and shutting them down. Or it could be – especially if our defensive response is one of fawning – one of kind of people pleasing, we enable other people, we are enabling them.

[00:27:26]
Okay, so, we're enabling others in their unhealthy and harmful behaviours. We continue to enable them to harm us and to harm other people, right. So, that's the impact of our actions when we're reacting, not out of a place of authenticity or a resilience, but just really just reacting.

[00:27:44]
When we are able to respond from our true selves, right – that means really, we go back in, you know, like when the whole inside out analogy – the avocado analogy – we descend down the layers from, this is what's going on around me, to processing how I'm feeling. My thoughts, how my body is responding – going back and reconnecting with my inner core, my core identity

[00:28:12]
And then coming back out with the clarity of this is who I am. This is what I stand for. Right, so, when I can respond from my true self, then my action comes from a place of quiet confidence. It doesn't have to be brash or loud. And at the same time though, when our actions come from this place of truth, our actions are a lot more impactful, right?

[00:28:37] THE IMPACT OF MY ACTIONS ON OTHERS
What's the effect on people? It could be – you can find that when you respond truly, authentically, it gives people direction and hope, right? It can inspire and remind them to respond from their best selves too. It's helping them to move towards truth and goodness, and beauty and authenticity as well. Now, that doesn't mean that people's – the impact on other people will always look good, okay or look like it's positive.

[00:29:06]
That's because – and this is a caveat – because when we respond from our true selves, remember we live in a world that, unfortunately, has a lot of fear. There's a lot of brokenness. There's a lot of aggression. There is a lot of inauthenticity. And there's a great lack of integrity in our world.

[00:29:27]
It's part of the fallen reality in our world. So, when we respond from our true self, while we do bring light and hope to some, at the same time, it can trigger other people who are threatened by authenticity because they just happened to be in that time or in that place in their lives, you know, in the season – in their lives where they're just not ready.

[00:29:51]
Okay, or just cannot make this interior journey. They just are not able to respond authentically. And then when we act or live authentically, sometimes we'll make such people upset and angry. Okay, and then we may actually get a negative response from them – negative reaction from them. But even then – even when it seems to bring out the worst in some people, when we live, you know, to the best of our authenticity –

[00:30:22]
– even then, our authenticity challenges and invites them towards their truth, towards authenticity as well. So, even if at that moment, you know, they're not ready – you know, our collective witness, the collective witness of people who are committed to making this interior journey to become our true selves, to live with greater integration and integrity.

[00:30:46]
The collective witness will, in time, continue to invite and challenge other to make this journey. So, that's the second point about, you know, what affects our ability to be resilient – which is our ability to self-regulate when we are dysregulated. To bring ourselves back into that place where we can enter into our core identity and then come back out with that calm confidence again, of who we are, okay. So, no longer just hiding or running away or wanting to fight but remembering who we are.

[00:31:21] 3. COMMUNAL SUPPORT
Okay, last point for today about a factor that impacts our resilience. And I will say that this factor would be communal support. Okay, community – in a larger sense. Resources – our resources are both inner and outer.

[00:31:36]
And what I've mentioned in the first two are actually our interior resources, our inner resources. And that's really important because ultimately, even if we have external resources, but we don't build our inner resources – you'll find that we still will not have resilience. Okay, but it's also very, very hard, very difficult –

[00:31:55]
– or maybe you could say even practically impossible to build inner resources without outer resources, without external resources – from outside of us. So, they both serve to strengthen each other, right? It is so important that we have safe people in our lives with whom we can process our difficult emotions with honesty.

[00:32:15]
In fact, we need people who can gently call us out when they notice that we are not in a good place. When they notice that we are in a disequilibrium, right – or that we're dysregulated – even before we maybe are aware of it, or maybe we are not ready yet to snap out of it. Right, but if we have people in our lives who love us, whom we trust, okay?

[00:32:38]
Who will gently call us out – you know, Hey, Hey, you're not in a good place. Right, so, people who can tell us; I am here when you are ready to deal with this because hey, you know, you need to deal with this, right? Such people – they are incredibly valuable, right? To have people who can tell us, I know this is hard, I'm struggling too –

[00:33:03]
– but we can give each other empathy, compassion, and support, you know? People who help us to be honest with ourselves, right? This kind of – this is what I mean by communal support. Okay, we need this kind of resources around us – this kind of safe people around us, where we can be vulnerable and who can call forth the best from us from us, from ourselves.

[00:33:24]
Well, apart from friends and peers, and companions – which are all very important – we also can remember that we can reach out for the support of those who are further along in the journey compared to us. And maybe even professionals who are equipped with specific skills to help us. So, I've always talked about the importance of remembering that counsellors, psychotherapists or a spiritual directors, you know? Especially those who are trained to work with sensitivity around trauma –

[00:34:02]
– around understanding, you know, how to be gentle in ways that can help us when we're healing. But at the same time, who teach us how to equip ourselves so that we grow our toolbox. You know, we learn more skills and more tools to, for example, help regulate ourselves. All these can be incredibly helpful when we need extra assistance.

[00:34:27]
And I would say this is especially the case when the level of stress in our lives reach a certain intensity. When we need to have a degree of self-awareness when we should stop trying to cook on our own. Because I think a lot of us – maybe it's also part of the response that we have learned.

[00:34:49]
We have to be strong, right? So, we don't ask for help. Or I'm going to try to do this on my own as much as I can. It is wisdom and maturity and authenticity, right – when we can be honest that I need resources beyond what I have right now. And I need someone else's help, and to reach out. So, I'm actually doing that for myself.

[00:35:13]
I mean, I'm in a space right now, at this time of recording, where I know that I'm at my limit, right? And I've been able to regulate and self-regulate with my usual – the resources close to me – both myself and my spouse and mature companions. But I'm at the point, I realize, okay, no, I need to, you know, make that appointment with a spiritual director.

[00:35:33]
I need to make probably an appointment with a counsellor so that I can continue to be in that space where I can grow in inner strength. Because I want – I so want to continue to make this journey into authenticity. I want to be resilient because you know why? I want to live what I believe. I want to be able to continue to walk my talk.

[00:36:00]
And I cannot do that, no matter how convicted I am about it – I can believe a hundred percent in the truth of what I'm saying, all these things that I'm saying to you. I can even be very convinced and talking about it, but I'm not going to be able to actually live it. Right, to have that integrity in the integration to actually live what I believe if I don't tend to have my interior space, right.

[00:36:32]
I really want that real inner resilience. So, that's my sharing. And I really hope that as you listen to this episode, you're taking stock and maybe also thinking of, you know, what you can do to help yourself – first and foremost yourself – before you're thinking about helping others. Because sometimes it can be very tempting to get out of doing the hard interior work, we need to do by helping others. And then we don't even realize when we are actually not helping them. Okay, because we lack self-awareness. So, I hope that you can think of something you might be able to do for yourself.

[00:37:13] PRAXIS: LISTEN. PONDER. ACT.
Okay, so, in terms of praxis prompts, you know, you would have listened to this – I always invite you in the first point, to listen to what resonates with you from what I shared today. And then to ponder. To ponder how resilient do you feel you are right now, with everything that's going on in your life?

[00:37:35]
Right, maybe on a scale of 1 to 10, how well do you feel you are really responding, in a way? You know, how much buffer do you have? How full or empty is your tank? Okay, that tank that contains self-compassion, wisdom, resourcefulness. Okay, we need that tank, to draw from it in times of hardship and stress, especially.

[00:38:02]
So, where are you on that tank? And, you know, three – the last point; to act. That's the invitation I had extended. Think of one concrete way that you can top up your tank – that you can give some compassion to yourself. Or allow someone else to give you compassion.

[00:38:29]
I'll just share this with you on the side: so, yesterday I asked for a friend to come and be with me to talk to me because I needed it. I needed it. And then, you know, I – other than asking her to come, I actually asked her like, hey, would you mind on your way up – you know, there's a place downstairs from my place that sells roti prata.

[00:38:52]
Okay, so, roti prata – and I wanted one prata, and one teh halia – okay, so kind of like ginger tea. That's my comfort food. That's one of my inner child's favourite comfort food. Now, for me to ask for that treat – I could easily just go downstairs and get it myself. I didn't need someone else to get it from me.

[00:39:12]
I didn't need my friend to get it for me. But I wanted to experience being taken care of. I wanted the treat. I wanted someone to treat me. I want someone to give me some compassion, some tenderness, you know – to spoil me a little. And so, I asked for it, I asked for it and she of course, wonderfully – I mean, she gave that to me.

[00:39:31]
She brought it up for me. And even though it was just a little bit of time, it wasn't a very long time that we had together. That one act – like my choice to ask for help and to ask for a treat – it actually topped up my tank a little, you know? It gave me some more strength to look at what I was dealing with in my life right now.

[00:39:55]
What was so stressful to me, what was making me so, you know, emotionally drained. With more – I don't know – just with more hope and more courage, you know, sometimes, something so tangible as the presence of a friend and comfort food – it reminds us someplace deep within, that we have more strength than we think.

[00:40:21]
And we have more resources than we think we do. Okay, we just need to continue to tap into that. So, I invite you to think of one way – okay, no matter how seemingly small or silly – that you can feel more yourself, that you can remind yourself of your worthiness, of your dignity and that you are loved. So, that's it. I wish you well until the next episode.

[00:40:53] CONCLUSION
Thank you for listening to Becoming Me, where new episodes drop every first and third Wednesdays of the month. Remember, the most important thing about making this journey is to keep taking steps in the right direction. No matter how small those steps might be, and no matter where you might be in your life right now, it is always possible to begin. 

The world would be a poorer place without you becoming more fully alive. Don't forget to visit my website at becomingmepodcast.com and to subscribe to my newsletter as well as to this podcast. Until the next episode, Happy becoming!