The World is Round

Had a conversation today with someone that was life-changing. I was asked what I was like as a child, and I immediately thought of the hours upon hours of home videos my grandparents have in their house of me just... talking. At 7, 8, 9 years old, I would just sit in front of the camera and talk animatedly, sing songs, interview my 2-year-old brother as if I were a talk show host... just anything I could think of so I could be a chatterbox and talk non-stop for hours at a time.

 

Then I started wondering what happened to that animated person, that girl who would sing off-key and laugh and make up stories, who would tell jokes to the camera woman (hi grandma!) and pull my brother away from his G.I. Joes so I could re-create our own personal Oprah Winfrey show. (I know, the resemblance is striking.) There was such life there, such innocence and purity, and so much energy that kids are known to have. And I ran with that energy; I was off the walls. No wonder my parents signed me up for every available sport; they probably just wanted me to expend enough energy so I would stop talking for half a minute.

 

As I continued in conversation with the person who asked about my young self, I realized I had held onto something for 20 years or so that I had never expressed out loud. It was a negative event in my life, something that someone said to me that really hurt me. Sure, I'd written it down, I'd journaled about it and probably even written about it to a friend, but I had never been able to say it out loud. There was so much shame involved, and embarrassment, and pain, and for these reasons I could never audibly say it. But today, in this conversation, she urged me to say it. Because in saying it, she explained, I could shed light on the lie that it was and expose it to daylight, expose it to the truth.

 

For example, let's say that when you're 5 years old your uncle tells you that the world is flat. You are just in kindergarten and so you believe them, not having any other influences or facts. They repeat this fact to you for years, and even when you learn in school that the earth is round, you always sort of question if it really is round. In the back of your head, you think, "But my uncle said the earth was flat, and he seemed so certain, so..." And because of these differences of opinion, you never voice what your uncle said. Maybe you're afraid he was wrong and you don't want to expose his ignorance. Maybe you are embarrassed that you are related to someone who believes something so ludicrous. Maybe you're afraid the rest of the world is wrong, and if you tell people what your uncle said, they will suddenly realize he was right, and it will cause your whole world (literally and figuratively) to come crashing down. You don't want to believe your uncle, but why would he tell you that over and over again if it wasn't true?

 

So there I was today, being encouraged to voice something and expose the lie for what it was. After thinking about it for 5 minutes, feeling my heart beat faster, my palms become sweaty, feeling a bit dizzy, seeing spots, and literally thinking I was going to fall out of my chair, I just said it. And guess what? The world didn't come crashing down. I repeated something that someone had said that I'd been hanging onto for 20 years, and as soon as I said it, I realized how ridiculous it was. It didn't even make sense. When shown the light of day, its validity and power over me vanished. And it vanished itself. And at 31 years old, I could have felt sheepish for having such a physical reaction to saying a few words, but when I put myself in the shoes of my childhood Katie, the fear and embarrassment suddenly didn't seem so silly.

 

And then I immediately felt exhausted and wanted to cry, and realized that when you hang on to something for 20 years and longer, it can be an exhausting process to finally release it. But you also feel so much lighter.

 

 

Learning a lot on my journey. These 10 days have been, hands down, the hardest days of my life, but they have also been some of the best, most enlightened, exciting, and most inspired days as well. Funny how sometimes those go together. 

I'm realizing that it's okay to be human, it's okay to make mistakes, and it's okay to try again and again on some things. We are all here to learn, to love, to live in the best way that we can, but we also have the obligation to continue to improve ourselves and our situations. So far this journey has been a wonderful time away, as it takes me away from all the things I use to not think about the really important things, the things in my life that need attention: God, reflection, prayer, mindfulness, bringing more gratitude into my life, getting more tuned in to my emotions and why I do things, increasing my joy, thinking about the ways I want to be better as a person and bring more energy to my life and my relationships. It's amazing what one can do inwardly when they decide to take some time away from the things that tend to numb our emotions. For me, that's a variety of things, but mostly an overabundance of sugar, my phone, and Facebook, all of which have been non-existent or almost non-existent these past 10 days. I guess that's what the journey was all about for me, just going somewhere or getting to a place where I could spend time away from the emotion-numbers, have to face my feelings and face my life. And today was definitely a day of facing my fears, feeling the emotions, and bringing some truth to a place that needs healing. Because the world is in fact round, and it's about time I cleared up that major misunderstanding.

Perfection and Shame

I want to be perfect, all the time. Say the perfect things, do everything perfectly. I think a lot of us would like to be perfect and never make another mistake again. But of course, doing and saying everything perfectly is an impossible expectation.


I think my particular focus on perfectionism comes from being a Type A person, being the 1st born in my family, being anxious, and having 25 years of OCD under my belt. And OCD is like perfection on steroids, and then multiplied by 100. Just as an example, when I was about 6 years old, I became obsessed with perfection. I wasn't sure what was going on at the time, but there was a definite shift in things, and suddenly perfection became my life. I had to do things over and over again until I got it right. Writing, playing sports, getting dressed... One morning, I was particularly anxious, and had to put my shoes on 17 times in a row. Each time I did it, I didn't tie the knot perfectly, or the tongue was bunched up, or whatever. And because the whole process had to be perfect, I had to take both shoes off and start again from the beginning. About 20 minutes later, when I finally felt okay with the process, I was in tears. Frustrating. This same focus on perfection exists in my life today (although not with shoes, but other manifestations). It's a ridiculous part of my life.


While the OCD perfection is an anomaly, it did set the stage of my life of always trying to be meticulously perfect. And whether or not your particular drive to be perfect is as extreme, most of us experience the day-to-day pressures we put on ourselves to be perfect, to live up to the standard we've set. I wonder why there is such a focus on being perfect. In this society, in our families, amongst our friends. We all know we make mistakes. We all know that for the most part, we have the best intentions. Why do we set such impossible expectations for ourselves and others? Not only do we expect ourselves to be perfect, but we also demand perfection from those around us.


At the core of our being, we are all trying our best in this life, trying to love and be loved the best we can. Sometimes we mess up; we can be pushy, or rude, or be needy sometimes. We have miscommunications with people, we can be oblivious to their needs, we can be careless or thoughtless, or we can follow our egos and make a mess of things. There are so many ways to make mistakes, regardless of our good intentions. But maybe that's okay. A friend once told me, "If we were all perfect, what would be the purpose of being here?" I think there is a purpose to this life, and that purpose, in my opinion, is to become the best versions of ourselves. Our highest self, the one who loves and gives and comforts and spreads joy, who forgives and is always kind. Who reacts to friends' offenses with a smile and a hug, and a reminder that they are loved. I see these qualities and characteristics in my friends and family members very frequently, and every once in a while I see myself reflecting these qualities. But no one is there yet; we all have days where we could have done things so much better. 


I can think of 2 things that are important when dealing with our own and others' imperfections: The first is to forgive ourselves when we make mistakes. There is no point in beating ourselves up for things that we wish we would have done differently. There is no point in living with the shame that we hang onto over mistakes we've made. If we learn something from a mistake, we probably won't make that same mistake again. And if we do make that mistake again, maybe it's something that needs a bit more time and effort to remedy. And maybe it needs more love and compassion. Whenever I'm not being my highest self, whenever I am panicked or start to shut down with a friend, that behavior comes from a place of pain. Maybe not even reasonable pain, but it is a response out of fear, and fear is rarely reasonable. And when that friend reacts with love, gives me a hug, says something kind and gentle, it turns the situation around. We are all trying our best, remember? Reminds me of lyrics from an Oasis song. "Someday you will find me. How many special people change?" The real me is there, sometimes covered by a defense mechanism or a wall or a fit of panic. But I'm under there, and always trying to grow and progress and change into a person who does not put up walls so quickly. Who does not shut down at the first feeling of vulnerability.


The 2nd thing is to assume the best from our friends. Whatever they do, whatever they say, assume the best intentions. That's usually what they are trying to convey anyway, and it is our own background noise that sometimes gets in the way of hearing the truth. It goes the other way, too. If our friends assume the best intentions from us, a lot of miscommunications and misunderstandings can be avoided. How many times do we assume something about a friend, and later find out that our assumptions were totally off? When I was in high school I sent an email to someone at the beginning of the summer, and never heard back. The entire summer I thought he didn't like me, that I was "too much," that I had somehow crossed the line. When I went to talk with him when school resumed, it turned out he had never even gotten the email. I had assumed something for months that wasn't even true. We had a good conversation and have been great friends ever since.

Brene Brown, researcher and TED speaker extraordinaire, gives a great talk on shame vs. guilt. "Shame drives 2 big tapes: 'Never good enough,' and if you can talk it out of that one, 'Who do you think you are?' Shame is not guilt. Shame is, 'I am bad.' Guilt is, 'I did something bad.' Guilt: 'I'm sorry, I made a mistake.' Shame: 'I'm sorry, I am a mistake.'" It's interesting how we can make a mistake and then paint our entire existence as the mistake. Like we are sorry for what we did, but so sorry that we apologize for existing.


At some point, we have to let go of the shame of our mistakes. We have to move on, and not cling to the impossible ideal of perfectionism. We are going to make mistakes in this life, and as long as we are trying our best, that's okay. We are all amazing beings, and sometimes the best parts of ourselves get hidden beneath all of this shame and criticism, both self-criticism and criticism from others. If we continually focus on the areas of our lives where we are our highest selves, we will be so overcome with love for ourselves that it will lift us up. Loving ourselves, and loving others, seems to be the solution to most problems. And, when you are so full of love and gratitude for yourself and for others, no negative feelings have a space to be there.


Here's to always knowing that, no matter what we do or say or feel, we are amazing. That is our core, that is our identity. We shine.

We are worthy

When I was younger, I got this idea in my head that I didn't have anything important to say. And the way that this thought manifested was that I wouldn't talk much; in class, with my friends, in public. And when I did talk, I made sure to speak very quickly so as not to waste people's time. It was weird; I clearly remember my 6-year old self going through this thought process. I still don't talk a lot, at work or in social gatherings. Sometimes, if I spend a bit of time talking with a friend, I will say, "Thank you for the talking time. I really appreciate it." I finally had one friend say, "You don't have to thank me! We're friends; friends talk. It's not this great burden to spend time with you." What a concept!

Looking over some of my journals, even current ones, I see that I mostly write about the interactions I had that day, and how they made me feel worthy. What people said to me that day, what they did that touched my heart... Why do I write about these things, instead of world events, or my struggles or successes, or thoughts about life? Time and time again, I see that all I've really written are the wonderful but daily, routine examples of people loving me. It's like I'm somehow still trying to convince myself that I am worthy. When really, I don't need any evidence; I am worthy because God made me, and why would He waste time on making something or someone that wasn't extraordinary?

Recently, in the past couple of months, I've had some challenges and difficulties that I can very easily attribute to this fallacious thinking of personal unworthiness. I can recall times in my life where I felt incredibly unworthy. Like I didn't matter, like I wasn't worth spending time with, and that I was really just garbage and had been cast off to the side. Where these thoughts came from doesn't really matter, but what matters is how I approach them now and try to change them into what is true, and grasp my own innate worthiness. Because not only does the harmful thinking affect me, it affects the people around me, the people I have relationships with. And if I enter into a friendship or partnership with the thinking that I am always unworthy, and spend the entire friendship trying to prove my worthiness, or conversely, looking for ways that people seem to also be saying, "You're unworthy" and thus prove the conclusion I've already come to, then that's a waste. A waste of time, energy, and irreplaceable moments that could be spent embracing our own worthiness and the worthiness of the person we are with. A waste of the gift of the relationship that has been given to me.

All of us are extraordinary, and incredibly worthy. Worthy of love, worthy of time, worthy of each other, and worthy of God's love. No matter what; no matter what we've done, what we've been through, or how we feel about ourselves.

A few years ago, my friend and Christian Science lecturer Marta Greenwood gave a great analogy to demonstrate our worth. She started by taking a $20 bill out of her pocket, and asking who in the audience would like it. Many people raised their hands. Then she rolled it into a ball, threw it on the ground, stomped on it, smashed it below her feet. She picked it up again and told people how dirty it was now. Did anyone still want it? Of course! The worth of the bill hadn't changed; it was still worth just as much as it was before she stomped on it, before it became messy. And Marta explained how our worth was like that. No matter what we had been through, or how the world affected us, we were still just as worthy, being children of God.

Brene Brown, an amazing researcher and speaker, gives a great TED talk where she addresses our worth. She talks about vulnerability, and how a feeling of worthiness as being the tipping point for feeling loved and a sense of belonging. And the inverse is also true: how, if we don't feel worthwhile, we often struggle with feeling loved or like we belong. (Also, I just found out if you type "worthiness" into Google, she is the 4th result to turn up.)

How can we feel worthy when all we can see are our mistakes? Can we get passed what the world may want to say to us, and realize that we are indeed God's amazing creations? No matter what we were told as children, or what people tell us as we grow up, it is our responsibility as adults to reject anything in our thoughts or actions that contradicts that we are God's masterpieces. I need to reject the idea that I am unworthy, and unlovable and unloved. During the past couple months, I heard "Landslide," by Fleetwood Mac a few times, and one of the lines really spoke to me: "Can the child within my heart rise above?" What great self-talk. No matter what the band meant by the lyrics, to me it was a directive to cast off any thought or outdated view that was untrue and did not respect myself as God's. Because I am His. And I can rise above any of the garbage that was told to me, because it's not true.

This all reminds me of the parable of the wineskins in the bible. Casting off the old for the new. Having a newer, better way of thinking about our reality, our identity, our relationship with God. How the old wineskins (our old way of thinking) couldn't hold the new wine (the new truth, the new grace). "Neither do people pour new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the skins will burst; the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved" (Matthew 9:17). When faced with the foolishness of something we have always believed to be true (in this case, my unworthiness), it requires a new way of thinking, a new way of doing things. I talked about this more in a previous blog post called "Fixing the Pecan Pie."

And no matter how hard it may be to radically change our way of thinking, as we all know that the prime age for learning long-lasting beliefs is in our childhood, we can succeed. As e.e. cummings said, "It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are." But if we have anything, it's courage. And God. That's all we need.

The good moments

Sometimes the good things in life get so covered up by our present circumstances, or by arguments we have with people, or by a loss we experience. While we don't want to spend our time thinking of the past, sometimes reflecting on a good moment or a shared experience with a loved one can bring a lot of comfort when we need it.

I have been thinking lately of a friendship I have with one of my closest friends. Even though she passed away about a year ago, our friendship is still there; I still feel her presence, I talk to her sometimes, and she will always be such a big part of my life.

Before she passed away, we talked on the phone and had a bit of a miscommunication. It wasn't an argument, or even a disagreement, just a stupid and strange miscommunication. However, since it was the last time we ever talked, it became bigger and more ridiculous in my mind than it probably was in reality. Sometimes it really bothers me that we didn't have a chance to clear things up before she passed, as I know that if we had talked after that phone call, we would have laughed about our own silliness and patched things up.

Our entire friendship was based on love and admiration and tenderness for one another. Affection, compassion, shared interests, very similar backgrounds. There was such richness and fullness of the friendship, such intensity, that when she passed it was like I hit a brick wall. It felt like such a sudden stop to something, someone, that was so lovely in my life. And even though I believe that life goes on and that we don't just stop when we pass away, it still felt like a very abrupt end to one of the best friendships I have ever experienced.

However, what was amazing to me was the love that I felt even after she had passed away. There were so many loving moments in the few weeks after, so many times where I thought of her and felt peace and contentment, times where I felt her presence and felt she was giving me a great big hug. It was like her intense way of loving hadn't stopped; and why should it? If life is eternal and love is this big powerful force that cannot be destroyed or stopped, why wouldn't I feel love from her even after she passed away? It was a hard time in my life but somehow still so full of this overpowering love.

When I want to feel her presence even more, I recall our greatest day together. We didn't see each other very often, but we had this one wonderful day, October 21st, our best day together, and it remains so clear in my mind. I flew in to the East Coast from Seattle and met her in the morning at a hotel. We hugged and chatted and laughed and shared parts of our lives, we went shopping, we talked with people, we joked with each other, teased each other almost relentlessly, sang songs at a church service, played games, traded gifts, had dinner together, talked about our future both in terms of our individual lives and things that we would do together... It was one of the best days of my life. And that was the essence of our friendship, all of those good moments and conversations and love and tenderness. It wasn't about the 10-second miscommunication we had when we were both feeling grumpy, a time when neither of us were our best in that moment.

Even though I felt so much love surrounding my friend, it took a few months to not be bothered by our last conversation. It was hard to let it go, to release the guilt I was reliving over and over. But when I think of the friendship now, I feel all of the love that is still there, that somehow, amazingly, seems to still be constantly renewing itself. I think about the laughter we had, the way we got such mutual delight out of teasing each other. That is the important stuff, the stuff I can keep in my thought and recall whenever I want to feel her presence. At the very core of our interactions, that was the true essence of our friendship, the only thing that really mattered in our connection to one another.

Loneliness

About 3 years ago I was traveling overseas, visiting some European countries. I love travelling, exploring new countries and cultures, eating new food and hearing new languages. But usually when I travel, whether I am traveling alone or with someone, I spend long periods of time by myself. I write, I take pictures, I think about things... I love this alone time, but because I'm away from home and from everything familiar in my life, I can feel pretty lonely sometimes.

This particular trip was no exception. I even felt so lonely one day that I contacted a Christian Science practitioner in the country I was traveling through, to see if they could pray with me. Unfortunately, they were unavailable as they were in the U.S., doing a series of lectures. Instead of contacting another practitioner to see if they were available, I decided to visit the nearby Christian Science branch church that next Sunday, and to continue praying on my own.

That Sunday, I slept through my alarm and woke up about 45 minutes before the church service was to start. I quickly got dressed and the friend I was staying with walked me over to the church. Neither of us was certain where it was, but somehow we found it. I went inside and my friend walked back home, after making sure I would know how to get back to her place.

I walked in and was immediately greeted with a smile from the usher at the door. He didn't recognize me as a member of that church, and so he asked me where I was from, and how I liked my trip so far. I felt so cared about, just from these simple questions. I then walked into the sanctuary and found a place to sit, but not before a handful of other people all smiled at me and made me feel incredibly welcome.

That week, the bible lesson was, "God the only cause and creator." I remember thinking that each of the bible verses and citations from Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, by Mary Baker Eddy, was written specifically for me. Each citation resonated with me, and seemed applicable to what I was dealing with at the time, a deep sense of loneliness. Up until that time, I had felt that much of my sense of worth came from other people; what they thought of me, if they loved me or thought I was lovable. I knew on an intellectual level that God's opinion was the only one that mattered, and I knew He loved me, but I was still struggling with this idea on an emotional level. When I heard, "Without him was not any thing made that was made" (John 1:3), I was reminded that God was the creator of everyone and everything. And when I heard, "There is but one primal cause" (S&H, 207:20), that reminded me that He alone was responsible for all the good in my life. As the bible lesson continued, I was struck by how relevant it was to what I was working on.

After a couple minutes of listening to the lesson, and feeling such love and care from the people, essentially the strangers, around me in the church, I felt this incredible feeling of warmth and wholeness enveloping my entire being. It felt tangible, this feeling of being a complete and loved creation of God, and having everything I needed right there. I no longer felt lonely, or broken, or like I was lacking anything or anyone. It was amazing.

I continued with the rest of my trip, and didn't feel the sense of loneliness that I had been feeling up until that wonderful church service.

The transforming of ingratitude

I was feeling down the past couple of days. I have been having some pain in my back for quite some time (over 2 years now), and have been unable to find the cause or the solution. I have prayed, I have talked with professionals, I have had CT scans, and nothing has relieved the pain, or even shed light on the situation. But finally, a couple of days ago, I went to see a specialist, and he saw what it was that has been causing me so much pain. He offered a couple of solutions, both pretty intense, but said that it could most likely be remedied with one of those options.

After I left his office, I could feel a sadness washing over me. Instead of feeling grateful that after 2+ years, I finally had some idea of what was wrong and what I could do to fix it, I was feeling bitter about the "diagnosis." I felt the methods of getting to the place of healing were too intense, especially when it was only "most likely" going to be a healing, not a 100% guarantee. I had been hoping that it was going to be a quick fix, just simply popping my spine back into place or something of that sort. I was feeling resentful that the physical therapist indicated that a car accident I had 5 years ago was the most likely cause of this pain, and that it had taken a couple of years for the symptoms to catch up to me. I was feeling angry that something as brief and as unlucky as an accident could cause years of pain, especially when the accident wasn't even my fault. And even though I wasn't at fault, I was still the one who was going to have to either suffer with the aftermath of it or go through intense rehabilitation to get better. It felt incredibly unfair.

The interesting thing is, right after I had the car accident (like, a second after my car stopped spinning across I-5), my first feeling was one of extreme gratitude. I was so grateful to be alive, as while my car was careening through 4 lanes of rush-hour traffic, I had thought that that was it. My life flashed before my eyes, I was terrified, and then a few seconds later, I realized I was still alive by the grace of God. And I was SO GRATEFUL. I remember stepping out of my car and pinching myself, checking to see if I was in a dream or if I was in fact still alive. Even though my back and neck muscles were a little sore, I felt like jumping for joy. I wrote about this miraculous experience here.

But in the past couple of days, that gratitude seemed to disappear. Instead of feeling grateful for life and for experiencing all that I have experienced in the past 5 years because I have been alive, I felt hopeless and sad. Where did all the gratitude go for the gift of life that I realized was indeed a gift on the day of the accident all those years ago?

Today, as I was resenting the car accident, I realized that life is complex. Life is short, but also, it is infinite. This material picture is not all there is to life; it doesn't end here when our physical bodies are no more. And on my best days when I am striving to be my highest self, I know that each day is a gift, and each day after the car accident is a day that, for that split second, I didn't think I was ever going to see. It made me view the conversation with the physical therapist a bit differently, and thus it made me feel so much gratitude for life and for all that I have experienced. Instead of feeling ingratitude for what I have to deal with now in the accident aftermath, I suddenly felt grateful for the gift of the past 5 years, and gratitude for all that I have yet to experience because I am alive.

A similar but completely different experience happened a few weeks ago with a friend of mine. The prominent feeling in this friendship, the feeling I have most when I think about this person, is gratitude. I am so grateful they are in my life and so grateful that God felt it fit to cross our paths. But for a few months earlier this year, I started to feel some ingratitude towards this person. Because I could feel this ingratitude seeping in, I decided to start writing a gratitude list, reasons I was grateful for this person. And once I started writing the list, I realized that I had developed an expectation in the friendship a few months prior, and that was skewing the normal gratitude gauge. Once I figured out the ingratitude was coming from the expectation, I eradicated the expectation and all was back to normal. Well, actually, I now feel even more grateful for this person than I ever have, but I think that is because gratitude begets gratitude. And once you start expressing gratitude, there is more in life to be grateful for. It's a wonderful cycle.

The gratitude I feel for this friend has some similarities to the gratitude I feel at being alive. Because I am so grateful for this person in my life, because I have had the opportunity to hang out with this person and talk with them and love them and enjoy their company, feeling any sense of ingratitude doesn't even make any sense. The gratitude of just having this person in my life renders all other expectations or feelings of ingratitude irrelevant. Ridiculous, even.

In both scenarios, I have been given a gift, and in these 2 situations, I momentarily forgot the blessings they offered. And I am so grateful that both times, God pointed me in the direction of what the true essence of each situation was: the love, the gift, the elements of every situation that I am so grateful for, to the exclusion of every other feeling.

Gratitude is a game-changer. Completely turns around the way I look at my circumstances, and replaces resentment or expectations or ingratitude with the sense that I feel so complete, so blessed, and that my cup runneth over.

A Disarming Love



When we are faced with conflict, we have many different ways in which we can respond. With anger, frustration, sadness, compassion, aggression, love, tenderness, or any number of other responses. Lately I have been thinking about how we sometimes respond to conflict with love, and what a difference that can make.

A recent example of what can happen when someone responds with love comes from Georgia, where a bookkeeper thwarted a possible mass school shooting. Antoinette Tuff, the school employee, was inside the school building when the shooter walked in. They had a 10-minute conversation where she helped calm him down, discussed his options, and empathetically opened up to him about her own struggles in life. During that conversation, she was also able to communication with the 911 dispatcher and keep the policemen outside so that she could deescalate the situation. She spoke to him with compassion ("We all go through something in life. You're gonna be okay.") and also with love. "I just explained to him that I loved him. I didn't know his name, but I loved him." You can watch the video here.

Thinking of responding with love, I recently read an article in Scientific American Mind about our negative self-talk. How should we respond to that negative voice? The author, Eleanor Longden, suggested that we treat negative self-talk compassionately, because it usually comes from a place of trauma or of deep pain. She experienced negative self-talk and even heard voices, and instead of responding with more negativity, she explored where it was coming from and responded with love until she didn't experience that kind of self-talk anymore. If I tell myself, "I'm stupid" or "I'm not worthy enough," that may come from a past experience that convinced me of those harmful ideas about myself. Instead of ignoring it or experiencing inner conflict, I can say, "I am worthy, I am loved, but there is a part of me that must still doubt it. Let me explore that so I can heal it from within, with compassion and love." Even the negative self-talk, which I reactively respond to with animosity and aggression, can be treated with love and turned around.

In my own life, there have been a few times where I was having a conflict with a friend and they responded with love, and it completely diffused the situation. In one instance about 6 years ago, a friend and I were talking on the phone, and I was incredibly upset about something. I was emotional, I wasn't thinking rationally, and being in the conversation was like watching a train wreck. But the entire time, my friend was calm and was just listening to what I had to say. And then she gently said:

"Katie, I need to tell you something."
"Okay... what?"
"I love you."

Suddenly the train stopped in its tracks. I took a deep breath and felt so loved in that moment that I didn't have anything else to say. At a time in that friendship where I was being pretty unlovable, definitely not being my highest self, she showed me that I was actually still lovable and that she loved me. We all make mistakes, we all say things we shouldn't say at some point in our lives, and her loving response brought me out of the grave I was digging for myself and up to a place of love and compassion. It was an amazing experience. The other experience I had was a different scenario but similar in the amount of stress present in the conversation, where I came out to my best friend when I was 20 years old. I thought that she was going to end our friendship, or that she was going to be upset or feel uncomfortable around me. I was terrified to tell her. And when I did, her response was simply, "You're my best friend. That's it." Not the response I had expected, but the best one possible, and a reaffirmation that the love was still present and that all was well.

In turn, when I respond in love to someone who is angry or panicked, it tends to soothe the situation. It turns what was seemingly going downhill into a much better outcome. Incorporating love and compassion and tenderness into difficult situations seems to make a huge difference. Even when caring for myself, if I treat myself with tenderness and love, I respond so much better. Instead of becoming angry with myself, I feel loved, I feel confident, and I feel worthy. I don't need to get these messages from anyone else because they are self-generated. And when I treat myself with love and care, I am more productive, happy, and hopeful, because I am not working against myself as often happens with negative self-talk.

Love is transformative. It can turn seemingly dire circumstances around, it can heal conflicts in relationships, and it can diffuse and soothe tense situations. When there is a conflict, it is amazing to see what happens when love is interjected into the situation.