How do I really feel?

What do I really think?

What do I actually want to do right now?

These questions seem simple. They are simple. But they’re also some of the most complex questions a person can ask themselves.

Because the answers aren’t as simple as “I feel fine,” “I’m hungry,” and “I need a vacation.” These are mere impulses. They’re parts of ourselves that speak, but we’ve got dozens of parts with different narratives. And they’re quite complex.

I’ll give a simple example so you can see that when it comes to larger decisions, everything becomes more complex: eating dinner.

You’ve got basic questions such as:

What do I want? What can I afford? What’s convenient?

Then you go a little deeper into:

What’s healthy? How healthy should I be? Or should I aim towards convenience and comfort? How much should I eat?

Then even:

What food is my body genuinely craving? Have I been eating healthy lately? What’s considered healthy? What have my eating habits been lately? How has my day looked…if it has been exhausting should I be eating healthy to provide myself with more energy or should I ‘treat myself’ with something more comforting? What’s my day look like tomorrow? How will the food that I put into my body impact my day and week? Am I eating this much because I’m actually hungry or because I want to be full?

You can even go as far as:

How am I eating influenced by cultural narratives? Family narratives? Spousal narratives?

Is the food I’m eating contributing to the narrative of how I want my life to be? Do I have a higher purpose or are things random right now?

This wasn’t meant to give you a headache. This is just an example of how the most automated of actions contribute towards our thoughts and feelings. Because I guarantee if you began changing a small thing like your dinner choice, other parts of your life would change. We’re an automated neural-network.

This was a mere dinner choice.

When we become more present with ourselves, better choices emerge. Between each choice we make there are a hundred other questions to be answered. Tweaking any one of those answers could shift everything. While this all seems like a mess—well, because it is—in therapy we sort out this tangled web of thoughts. We have automated responses to every part of our life.

When you can sit with any choice, big or small, and honestly and authentically contemplate it, you’ll find deeper, more authentic inner-voices emerge. Narratives that are closer to your core self. Closer to what you really feel, what you really think, and what you really want to do. Narratives closer to who you truly are. This is where you begin to experience true peace and true empowerment.

On a similar note, due to COVID-19, many people are beginning to encounter ‘truer’ thoughts. It’s been a time for many to uncomfortably slow down and contemplate the validity of drawn out narratives. With time away from people, it’d be right to contemplate if certain connections were merely automated or necessary. It’s been a time for people to contemplate thoughts on society, religion, employment, culture, family, love, purpose.

You know the whole ‘you can only find yourself by losing yourself?’ It’s true. You can only begin to encounter your true you when you contemplate and try things that deviate from your path.

I’ve witnessed a number of clients experience profound, life-changing breakthroughs, and you know the commonality? They’ve also started with a subtle shift in something they’ve done their entire life. On the surface, it seems random, almost inconsequential. But it has created an entire life of major shifts.

Awareness