Holiday Moments: from Mania to Meditation (Or, how to learn to love doing the dishes.)

The approach of winter holidays can feel like a tingling, sparkling, surprise tip-toeing delightfully around each November corner to thrill and delight us. They can also feel like a punch in the gut, accompanied by the dreaded, jingle-tinged whir of the holiday machine. It seems especially unfair and unsavory that we can even feel both at the same time. The dueling realities of childhood history often contain both loving acts of kindness and shocking acts of betrayal, not only in the same lifetime, but in the same year, in the same day. This mosaic can leave us confused, exhausted, feeling hopeful, helpless, and spent.

Picture one of your best holiday memories, and then one that doesn't hold the same warmth. They might be separated by hours or by years. I'm guessing that each of us, each year, puts a decent amount of energy into trying to regain the feeling of the former, and avoid the experience of the latter. We spend quite a bit of time in the past each holiday season, trying to prevent those ugly feelings or re-create serene ones. We also spend time in the future. We imagine the kind of holidays we want our kids to remember, and task ourselves with providing them a blemish-free catalog of memories. We spend all sorts of time, all sorts of places over the holidays. Almost anywhere but in the present.

Wilfred Bion, a 20th century psychoanalyst, is famously quoted for suggesting starting each session "without memory or desire." His aim is to truly hear one's meaning in each new moment, and not confuse it with what you expect, hope, or hope it not, to be. What if we were to approach the holiday season the same way? What if we endeavored to forget what we know about our own heavy baggage of holidays, both the dirt and the dazzle, and just see what is there?

"What if we endeavored to forget what we know about our own heavy baggage of holidays, both the dirt and the dazzle, and just see what is there?"

This may sound as if I'm suggesting we walk through the next few months with an enlightened stillness that may seem hard to achieve amidst the responsibilities and rhapsody of holiday mania. So, I don't suggest that we expect ourselves to achieve perfect neutrality in the face of gift shopping and holiday cookie baking. But, that we set an intention, pick a moment, or commit to picking several moments, when we try out really noticing just what's there. This can be as simple as stopping, breathing, and looking around. Noticing the light, the temperature, and the sounds in the room without judgment or quickly labeling what we find. Maybe try it now for just a moment. Look up and just identify the colors around you. Nothing more. Just that. See if something inside of you relaxes.

Several years ago, I tried a silent retreat in the beautiful green hills of Massachusetts. Each day we were assigned a schedule. My first day included sitting meditation, yoga, self-led retreat, lunch, dinner, and something called standing meditation. When I arrived for standing meditation, I found myself at a sink full of dirty dishes. Fluctuating between feeling baffled and outraged, I begrudgingly began to work, furious, and awash with mixed up feelings. How dare they call cleaning up standing meditation? I wanted to be outside in the greenery. Wasn't that a better use of retreat? How dare they trick a paying customer into believing "standing meditation" on their schedule was something meaningful, when it was just washing dishes? As you can imagine, it took a long time for me to begin to notice the temperature of the water, the hypnotic, shushing sound of it rushing from the faucet, the glisten of each newly cleaned plate. I didn't have to love scrubbing pots and cutlery, it didn't have to be my new forced enthusiasm, but I could pay attention and see what I found. I found my shoulders relaxing, my thoughts settling into a hum. I realized I had never paid attention to washing dishes before, ever. I noticed that surrendering to just the moment and nothing more brought with it an opportunity. Standing meditation became an unexpected refuge and a time to just be, to just be present.

Since my life and most of our lives don't normally involve retreat, I might suggest baking chocolate chip cookies from scratch. Not just so that you can meditate while mixing the batter and striking a tree pose waiting for the oven timer to go off, but so that you can taste them. When you bake recipes from scratch you notice weird things. Like salt in cookies. When you taste what you've made, you pay attention differently. You try to ferret out the ingredients you measured a fourth of a teaspoon of to see how and where they show up. Salt, it turns out, is a really important part of a chocolate chip cookie, but we wouldn't notice that unless we stop and tried to notice it. To love it even. Not in the sense that salt must be your newest enthusiasm, but to love noticing and accepting what happens to be in front of us in subtle ways.

So, for better or worse, you will likely find yourself doing dishes this holiday season. And, I hope you get to bake cookies, if you are the one who gets to eat them. And I wonder what it might be like if for a moment, or even many moments, maybe even when attending a yearly event we usually don't look forward to, we are brave enough to surrender. What if our holidays were experienced with fresh eyes, in the moment, as if we had never known holidays before.

Jennifer Cutilletta, LCSW

Notes:
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**[Image Credits: Holiday Memories, Meditation, Cookies]

Event: A Guide to the Treatment of Complex Traumatic Stress Disorders

Trauma Informed: A Guide to the Treatment of Complex Traumatic Stress Disorders

Date: Friday, May 23rd, 2014

Time: 9:00am - 4:00pm

Credit: 6 CEUs. Womencare Counseling Center is approved by the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation to provide Continuing Education Units to social workers (LSW/ LCSW), professional counselors (LPC, LCPC) and Marriage and Family Therapists (LMFT).

Location: Hilton Garden Inn, 1818 Maple Avenue, Evanston IL

Register: online, by phone at 847-491-0530, or by mail with this form.

About this workshop:

Complex Posttraumatic Stress is often the consequence of prolonged and repeated interpersonal trauma which has occurred during the developmentally vulnerable time of childhood. Most often these events involve abuse and/or neglect by primary caretakers.

We will describe the tri-phasic model of treatment and the special considerations for dissociative disorders, including challenges to sustaining the therapeutic alliance, creating safety, establishing affect regulation, stabilization, and the integration of traumatic experience.

This workshop is designed for mental health professionals who want to learn how to better provide treatment for some of our most injured populations. It is appropriate both for therapists new to the field and those more experienced frontline professionals who want to deepen their work by understanding the impact and treatment of Complex Posttraumatic Stress Disorders.


This workshop will address:

• The special challenges for clinicians in sustaining a therapeutic relationship with those who have survived ongoing childhood abuse or neglect.
• The phases of treatment and the corresponding tasks in each phase.
• Both the psycho-physiological impact of abuse and neglect and the relational implications.
• Helping traumatized clients learn to restore feelings as signals that promote effective problem solving.
• Engaging clients in a self-reflective process about ­previously disowned aspects of traumatic experience.
• The function and creation of dissociative defenses.

Staying Honest This Season

I know you celebrate something... Kwanzaa, Hanukkah, Christmas or that Seinfeld holiday George made up. There is almost inescapable, manic pressure in our country to wrap perfect presents when the weather turns cold. Whatever it is that has you pulling out your dress slacks and making that bread bowl spinach dip people go crazy for, I actually won't suggest that you "remember the reason for the Season.”

I won't suggest you savor the glow in a child's eyes as the warm radiance of holiday lights glisten off the snow reflecting their timeless joy. Those messages often shame us. We end up hauling our overtired 6-year-old away from the damn bowl of red and green M&M's for the millionth time at the holiday party of the snippy neighbor we resolved to be nicer to, using that harsh voice we resolved last New Year’s to abolish.

I could instead give you permission to leave the wrapping paper all over the floor and roll in it after opening presents, to get a babysitter on December 23rd, and eat the grilled cheese sandwich you actually like, instead of your aunt's beef wellington.

That's good, but what I really want to suggest you do this winter is something taboo. Really taboo. I want you to talk to your kids about how all the pressure of the magic and merriment stresses people out and explain that they're probably feeling that too. About how wonderful family get-togethers sometimes cause a confusing pit in their stomachs because it seems like everyone is smiling, but a lot is not being said. I want you to notice when your child is looking out the window with glazed eyes and ask yourself, have they been so bowled over by the frenzy to be blissful that they're panicked something is wrong with them because they're feeling drained and dissatisfied?

Holidays are hard for kids, too. Maybe harder. They don't know that it's a bunch of bunk to have the brightest bow, the best new bike, and the most creative holiday plans to go skiing, help the homeless, and batik your own Holiday Cards. They see the commercials and holiday marketing, too. So, create a magical holiday for them by making the spinach dip, stringing up lights, AND talking to them about how icky it was that Mommy and Daddy yelled at each other in the grocery store over what size Pannetone cake to get for the new 4th grade science teacher.  

It won't take away from the magic-  being honest and present is the magic. It will make the holidays cleaner, clearer, and better connected. Looking at the bad doesn't negate the good. You'll emerge partners in knowing that you'll be there for them in whatever confusing illusion is wrapping everyone else up in stress and sparkly sweaters. They'll know you see them… and nothing feels better at any time of the year.

*This post was written by Womencare Staff Member Jennifer Cutilletta, LCSW

Stress Reduction for the Holidays

The Thanksgiving season is a time of year to stop and reflect on all we have to be thankful for in our lives. However, it is also a time when unique seasonal stressors can take center stage. Traffic, weather changes, holiday shopping, and busy schedules are some common stressors in November and December. This season can also bring up some more serious stressors including financial concerns, unhealthy family dynamics, and feelings of loneliness.

When feeling stressed, consider these strategies:

1. Exhale. After you have fully exhaled, inhale slowly. Your breath is really central for bringing your nervous system from the stressed sympathetic nervous system to the more relaxing and calming parasympathetic nervous system. 
2. Take 5. This can be 5 minutes to yourself, 5 slow breaths, or 5 paces. 
3. Consider starting a contemplative practice, even if it is only for one minute every day. How might your work day change if you started every morning with one minute of silence or one minute of focused attention on your breathing? How might one minute of silence at the start of a meeting change workplace dynamics? How might your home change if you spent one concentrated minute looking at a safe, comforting object or work of art every evening? 
4. Stretch. I invite you to take a moment to center and ground yourself in your chair. You can interlace your fingers and stretch your arms up above your head and over to each side, if you like. Notice that your breath can always be moving, even when you are doing a simple stretch. 
5. Self-massage. Massage your neck, shoulders, arms, scalp, hips, or wherever you feel like you are holding tension and stress. 

These are some of my favorite tips for reducing stress around the holiday season. What are some of your favorite tips?

This blog post was written by Alissa Catiis, Staff Therapist and Yoga Teacher at Womencare Counseling Center.