High Achiever's Edge: addictive

Tuesday, January 31, 2017

Negative Emotions are Addictive

What’s just as addictive as cocaine, crack or heroine? Negativity! In fact, negative emotions are so addictive that our brains will actually seek out experiences and situations that evoke negative feelings.

The same area of the brain that seeks out pleasure also seeks pain. You may be wondering why this happens, well, it’s really simple: Negative emotions activate both the beta-endorphine and dopamine pathways in our brains.

These are the same pathways to activate pleasure; and people who are addicted to negativity get the same payoff as those who use drugs.

You can read more about it in one of my favorite Huffington Post blogs (an oldie, but still a goodie!).

ARE YOU ADDICTED TO NEGATIVITY?

I’ve created a short questionnaire to see if you are addicted to negativity. Answer the questions and tell me how you faired!

1) Do you find yourself being surrounded by the same “type” of drama and people no matter where you go?

2) Is it hard to make friends with people who are happy?

3) Are you the one your friends come to when things go badly?

4) Do you find yourself creating drama when things are going well?

5) Do you find fault with most things/people/circumstances? (Even if you give a compliment, do you find something that could be done better?)

6) Do you find yourself becoming angry for no reason, especially when things are going well?

7) Do you find yourself making excuses for your negative friends and family?

8) Is it hard for you to be around positive and happy people for a long time?

9) Do you feel comfortable around people with problems or drama?

10) If you removed yourself from the drama or negative people in your life, would you be alone?

If you answered “yes” to at least three of the questions, then you may be addicted to negativity.

The question becomes, how can you change your negative emotions and begin to live a more positive and fulfilling life The answer is quite simple, but very hard to most people to do: Stop living in denial.

STOP THE ADDICTION!

1) Find a therapist – QUICK! You may think you can beat the negativity addiction by yourself, but you can’t. You need help because your awareness is limited to what you know and the only thing you know is your negative surroundings. You need someone to assist you getting out of the negativity, healing emotionally, and living a happier, drama-free life.

2) Get away from your negative friends and family – or at least limit your involvement. Your surroundings need to change. If you are constantly surrounded by negativity, positivity has very few, if any, points of entry. If you don’t believe me, try this: tell your friends or family that you want to be more positive and see what they say. Some may agree with you and try to be less negative, while others may mock you.

3) Spend time alone. Like attracts like – it’s a rule that existed long before you and I were born. The only reason you are surrounded by negativity is because you are negative in some way. Spending time alone will allow you to become a little more open to seeing why you may be attracted to negativity.

4) Find people who are where you want to be. If like attracts like and you are looking for less negativity, then find people who are surrounded with little if any negativity and try to connect with them. This will take some time because you are trying to become less negative yourself. And, since they don’t surround themselves with negative people, you may not be invited in – just yet. Keep working on it and soon enough, you too, will enjoy the benefits of living a more positive and drama-free life!

I hope you found this helpful and as always, pleasant journeys!

Jinnie

Dr. Jinnie Cristerna is a psychotherapist, RoHun Doctor, author, and national mental health expert located in Chicago, IL. Dr. Cristerna works with talented and ambitious individuals, families, and corporations to help them break through and heal psychological roadblocks limiting their success. To learn more about Dr. Cristerna, go to www.HighAchiever.net

Monday, January 2, 2017

5 Signs that You Are Defensive

Have you ever been defensive? Even if you don’t think you have, chances are you have been. Everyone has a set of defenses – and we should. Being defensive occurs when you experience stress and simply means that you are psychologically on guard and ready to protect yourself from mental or emotional harm. While there are many reasons why your defenses were created, their ultimate job is to protect you.

Your defenses are typically created out of necessity at various points in our life-usually childhood. Defenses kick in to tell you when it is safe and unsafe to be who you truly are – and that can be a good thing. However, when you get older and your experiences become diverse, your defenses can become outdated and cause trouble in your personal and professional life.

In order for you to function adequately as you grow, your defenses must “evolve” to reflect your current circumstances. If you don’t evolve your defenses, then you risk understanding and responding to current situations the way you did when the defenses were created and that can be 20 years ago or more – YIKES! That is a huge mistake.

Let’s use this oversimplified example: A 7-year-old sees her brother being spanked for telling mom that he accidentally broke the vase. The 7-year-old is afraid of the same thing happening to her, so she avoids telling the truth. Now, this does not mean that she begins to lie, although it could result in such behavior. As she gets older, when faced with being honest she tries and learns how to effectively change the subject, point out other issues that do not involve her, or becomes nervous when confronted. These are all types of “defenses” that can hurt instead of protect her as an adult because she is responding to similar situations as if she were still 7 years old.

So how can you tell if you are being defensive? Here are five signs that may help. Ask yourself, “Do I …”:

1) Keep threatening ideas, feelings, memories, wishes, or fears out of my awareness by doing things like displacing, disconnecting from, intellectualizing, and repressing them.

2) Distort who I am, my body, or other people so I can regulate and/or maintain my self-esteem in minor ways. This is seen when people devalue or idealize others, for example.

3) Keep unpleasant or unacceptable stress, impulses, ideas or responsibility out of my awareness by denial, projection, or rationalizing.

4) Grossly distort who I am, my body, or other people by substituting real relationships with a fantasy in order to avoid conflict or by making others feel the way I really feel.

5) Act out, withdraw or become passive-aggressive when I feel stressed.

If you answered yes to at least one of these statements, then you can be defensive. Again, being defensive is quite normal and functions in an effort to keep you safe; however, if it begins to impact your relationships and career, then you want to seek help to get you to a better space.

Evolving your defenses is actually easy. With my clients, it usually takes three to four sessions with my clients doing hypnotherapy, RoHun, Yhandi and maintaining their progress on their own using their customized guided meditations. If you are unfamiliar with guided meditations and would like to learn how to relax, you can download a free meditation here.

HEALTHY DEFENSES:

When your defenses are healthy, the following behaviors are what will present themselves more than the ones listed above: anticipation, affiliation, altruism, humor, self-assertion, self-observation, sublimation, and suppression.

With love and light …

Jinnie

Read more on JetMag.com: http://www.jetmag.com/life/moment-of-clarity-life/5-signs-defensive/#ixzz4UIVZ7iBd