Category Archives: Psychology

Brain, Communication, Life Skills, Psychology, Stress and Trauma

The Impact of “Invisible” Illness

April 30, 2012 DAVID@energy11

When he was writing his book, Starting Points for a Healthy Habitat, Carl Grimes interviewed me for one of his chapters. Although Mr. Grimes was addressing the emotional and psychological impacts of someone with an environmental illness, what I said to him easily could be describing someone with a head injury or any other invisible condition such as chronic fatigue syndrome. The following is a quote from his book.

“Carl Grimes: What happens to someone when they have an ailment that is not obvious to others, such as one they believe to be caused by an exposure to an environmental contaminant?

David Pasikov: The ailment is not obvious because its symptoms and attributes are not familiar to others. A common example is a person with a broken leg who requires a cast and crutches. The cast and crutches are not only readily visible but also provide an obvious and generally acceptable excuse for that person’s behavior deviating from the accepted standards of their family, friends and peers. Also, because the healing requirements of a broken leg are fairly well known, that person’s behavior – although now much different than their peers – is fairly predictable and acceptable. No real surprises.

However if the ailment is not visible or not immediately accepted as a legitimate excuse for not meeting common standards of performance, then that person is expected – even demanded – to stop misbehaving. If they don’t, then they are assumed to be malingering – meaning that their own behavior is controllable by themselves, but they aren’t willing to do so.

Carl Grimes: What effect does this have on the person with the ailment?

David Pasikov: Their self-esteem suffers and their stress level increases. The experience usually retards their recovery process because they are now focused on, among other things, meeting the expectations of others at the expense of doing what is necessary for themself.

Carl Grimes: What happens socially?

David Pasikov: If their illness continues, they will gradually lose their friends. They won’t be much fun anymore. Furthermore, as you retreat to “lick your wounds” so to speak, you are also removing yourself from society. Your world becomes smaller and you increase your chances of becoming depressed.”

Brain, Life Skills, Psychology

Choosing Happiness is Good for your Brain

December 20, 2010 DAVID@energy11 1 Comment

The other day I was at Denver International Airport (DIA) on my way to fly to Jerusalem to visit my sister. I was sitting at a table outside of a coffee shop at the airport enjoying a sandwich before boarding for the first leg of my journey because nowadays you can starve on an airplane.

The upside of being a therapist is that you learn to read people’s body language and demeanor. That also is the downside as I couldn’t help but notice that the man a few tables away had an interesting facial expression. The corners of his mouth were turned down in a permanent scowl. A few moments later, his wife arrived with their lunch and as I glanced from time to time to look around, not once did I see him smile as they interacted. His wife did not look any happier than he did.

Fast forward to yesterday when I was on a bus with my sister going from her home to downtown Jerusalem. Being on a bus in Jerusalem is not as scary or brave as it sounds. You keep living or the terrorists win. The arrangement of the seats in buses here isn’t theater style; half the seats are faced to the front and half are faced to the rear.

Across the bus from me was a woman who was the opposite of the man at DIA. She had a wonderful look of happiness on her face and you could tell from the lines in her face that a slight smile was her natural expression instead of the scowl that the man had.

Before I left for this trip I was in L.A. doing a corporate training where we were teaching an advanced communications course to managers at a major software company. During part of the course we play a segment from the movie, “What the Bleep Do We Know”. The movie excerpt illustrates that neural pathways are established when we repeatedly do certain things or express particular emotions. There are chemicals for every emotion and as we express those emotions, neurons move and link, forming new neural pathways.

This process facilitates learning. For example, when we were learning to drive, it took a lot of concentration to steer, brake, park etc. and now we do all that while talking on cellphones, checking our gpses, changing channels and daydreaming. We have established the neural pathways necessary to drive.

Now, back to the man at DIA and the woman on the bus. If I read them correctly, he has well established neural pathways around being miserable (and broadcasting negativity to those around him) and it shows on his face. She has well established pathways of kindness and love and she not only radiated that but her facial expression reflected it.

So it appers to me that choosing happiness not only is good for your brain chemistry, it seems it could also save money on plastic surgery.

Psychology

Inner Peace Through Quieting the Inner Critic

February 7, 2010 DAVID@energy11 3 Comments

As I look back over my 20 years of practice, in the past I would see maybe one or two people a year who were dealing with acute anxiety and panic attacks. Currently I have three clients suffering with this. More than ever there is a need for inner peace as we navigate through challenges such as: uncertain economic times, aging parents, ourselves aging, relationship issues, etc. It is difficult if not impossible to have inner peace as long as our inner critic is screaming at us.

I have found that the ABC’s of Inffective Communication are: Accusation, Blame and Criticism. In a corresponding way, I feel that the ABC’s of Inffective Self Communication are: Self Accusation, Self Blame and Self Criticism. These are the tools of the inner critic at its worst.

Unless we are in a mode of self destruct, most of us want to remain in our integrity and play our parts effectively in life. At the same time, as we go through life we can adopt limiting beliefs and even self sabotaging programs. These can come through life experiences but they can also set in through messages received from parents, teachers, etc. Here are some examples. “You won’t amount to anything.” “Money is the root of all evil.” “There isn’t enough time in a day.” “True love is hard to find.” You get the picture. These external messages over time can get internalized and eventually they become the voice of the inner critic. For example, “You’re so stupid” can become, “I’m so stupid.” After all no one else on the planet has witnessed everything we have or haven’t done through life like we have. All of this data, left unchecked can be ammunition in the hands of our inner critic. If we are to move forward effectively, this is a leak that needs to be plugged.

Don’t get me wrong, we all need our inner critic. We all need to self reflect on our behaviors, our attitudes and our decisions. What I have grown to see however is that there is a healthy or green zone for the inner critic and there also is a toxic or red zone.

I recently was giving a presentation on the Inner Critic and one of the participants asked for clarification. He said. “In my business, if I find that my numbers are down, I tell myself that I need to focus on marketing.” I responded that this would be the inner critic in the healthy or green zone. I went on to illustrate what the inner critic would sound like in the toxic or red zone. In that mode the inner critic would be saying things like, “Your numbers are down; you are going to lose your business, to help yourself and your business we recommend using tools like this check stub creator software. You are lazy and are going to be on the street unless you gear up and do some marketing. I knew you would fail.” In the toxic or red zone, the inner critic is using fear and manipulation to motivate us. Not only is that ineffective but over time we can buy into those messages and do significant harm to our self confidence and our relationship with ourselves. Many of us are parents. We would never talk as harshly to our children as we talk to ourselves when we are in the red zone. We don’t want our children to feel badly about themselves. We can offer ourselves the same non toxic discipline that we offer to them.

Let’s consider the word “sin.” One of the roots of the word comes from archery and it simply means “missing the mark.” If I attempt to do something and I miss the mark, and my inner critic pounds me with toxic messages in the red zone, I wind up like Biff from the movie “Back to the Future” all covered in manure. In that state, it is difficult, if not impossible to hit the target on the next attempt. By staying in the green zone, we are setting ourselves up for success.

Early in my career, I was the Executive Director of a residential school for troubled teens. We had an expression there that has stuck with me, “You don’t beat a willing horse.” Chances are you want to play your part and do an excellent job. That being the case, you will respond much better to treating yourself with: unconditional self love, self respect, and positive reinforcement rather than self accusation, self blame and self criticism.

When you notice your inner critic pummeling you, know that this is an ineffective way of getting you to perform. Do what you can to shift the messages to the healthy or green zone. This helps change the inner critic into the inner co-worker.