Category Archives: Social anxiety

“Here’s The Line I Won’t Cross…..”

It’s one thing to set boundaries when you’re interacting with other people, but what about setting boundaries for yourself? If you can do this, it’s the beginning of a healthy relationship with the person that you often put last – you. Being happy with who you are, having self-respect and being present in your day-to-day life means that you’re more likely to find happiness rather than always pursuing a better tomorrow.

In our society, the media often tells us that having more is better – more money to buy things and more friends and experiences on social media – where does it end? Often, our spending hides a desperate need to escape feelings of dissatisfaction although underneath we know that happiness isn’t found in the things we buy or in dreaming about our next holiday.

But saying “no” is easier said than done and this is where our personal boundaries come in; they’re essential for establishing as well as sustaining personal relationships with others and also, ourselves. It’s when we say to ourselves as much as to others – “here’s the line I won’t cross”. That’s because we’re in a relationship with ourselves too. So, how to go about this? Well, have a look below and see what you think:

Think about your own worth – saying no becomes a lot easier when you detach your own worth from the things that you own (material possessions) as well as your professional identity. It doesn’t mean that you’re a better person because you have a bigger house or because you’ve lots of credentials. It’s more about your worth being part of who you are, your principles and sense of humanity.
Be honest with yourself too – if you really want a new designer watch, ask yourself why that is. Perhaps you have a desire for status or want to be noticed for having something recognisable but before you buy it, ask yourself what or who you’re doing it for. The same with a job promotion – maybe you’re doing it for an increase in salary but if it’s mainly so that people look at you differently, ask yourself if that alone is enough for you or is being happy without the extra stress more important?
Remember that you can’t be everything to everyone. Trying to please a lot of people often results in spreading ourselves too thin. You’ve only so much time and energy so be careful with your choices and don’t constantly push yourself too hard.
That brings me onto comparing yourself with others – what someone is doing and how they’re doing it rarely has any bearing on what and who you are. Resolve to focus on your own life with its standards and goals.
Lastly, maybe you’re your own worst critic! Try to have realistic expectations of yourself and when you set goals, take into account that they need to be realistic. Unachievable goals can set us up for failure, whereas achievable ones help us feel good about ourselves as well as able to go a little bit further if we want to.

Hopefully you’ve enjoyed reading this blog and, if so, you can see my blogs as soon as they are published (usually on Wednesdays) by pressing the ‘follow’ button and you can share them with your friends. You can also find me on LinkedIn, Instagram (samebutdifferent) and read my FB posts every week at Same But Different #samebutdifferent #relationships # issues #bloggerforever #lovewriting #livingchange #makeitcount #canidothis #canyoudothis #ukblogger #femaleblogger

Are You In Love With A Difficult Person?

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Much as you love your partner, you may well find them difficult some of the time or even most of the time. Maybe when you first met, they seemed charming and fun although a little challenging (which you possibly found very appealing in some ways!). But now, you’re finding that you’re second-guessing yourself, doubting your own decisions and, somehow, it’s not so much fun.

If you’ve tried being considerate, making excuses for them and not expecting too much, you may find yourself feeling hopeless at times. If your partner has the following traits, it’s time to find different strategies:

Communication and discussion is vague – decisions that you made together somehow get changed or even denied.
They often blame you for things – it’s never their fault. Actually, they may not always blame you; sometimes it’s their family, their friends, colleagues or even the weather but whoever or whatever is to blame, they’re not accountable and can’t be wrong.
Instead of acting on facts, they only respond to their own feelings rather than what actually happened. This means that they make assumptions about what you’re feeling, whether it’s about your motives or your needs, and truly seem to believe to that they know you better than you know yourself!
They’re incapable of self-reflection – looking inwards is almost impossible for them.
Every disagreement turns nasty because any conversation that they can’t control will end with you giving in sooner or later, either because of an argument or because they become silent, ignoring you (passive-aggressive behaviour).

So, if you recognise this all too well, how can you deal with it?

Step one is to try to get the root of what is wrong – is there a bigger underlying problem? Try to see things from their perspective and reverse your roles to try to understand how they feel. Try to find the middle ground but make sure that your own needs are taken into account as well.

Keep calm, however hard that is, but if this is important to you, stick to what you feel is right stating your point of view calmly.

Try to understand their personality – everyone is different and things that you find easy to cope with, they may find very challenging. If you can find new and more positive ways to react, it will help to keep things smooth between you. That’s not to say that you have to be a pushover – if you honestly feel that you’ve been reasonable, don’t capitulate and fall in with what they want. You may have to withstand a day or two of silence which is unpleasant, but in the long-term, it might be worth it.

Pick your battles – not everything is worth arguing about so choose the issues that are really important to you and don’t waste your energy fighting about small things.

If they want space, try to give them that because if you have a balance in your lives, sometimes pursuing different hobbies and doing things in different ways, it can be very positive for your relationship.

If your partner is usually kind and loving, try to focus on that as much as possible.

Unfortunately, if you’ve given it your best shot over a period of time and things continue as they were, it might be time to walk away but before you do that, couples counselling is another option that will help you to clarify the situation between you. Although one or both of you might be resistant to this, it could be just the thing to put you back on the right track or clarify the fact that it’s best to separate – not easy, but sometimes the only reasonable option left.

Hopefully you’ve found this blog interesting and, if so, you can see my blogs as soon as they are published (usually on Wednesdays) by pressing the ‘follow’ button and you can share them with your friends. You can also find me on LinkedIn, Instagram (samebutdifferent) and read my FB posts every week at Same But Different #samebutdifferent #relationships # issues #bloggerforever #lovewriting #livingchange #makeitcount #canidothis #canyoudothis #ukblogger #femaleblogger

Having Difficulties With Your Family?

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When I say your family, I mean either your parents, siblings or other relatives – maybe all of them! Especially after a prolonged holiday period like Christmas and New Year, chasms can appear in family relationships that didn’t see so obvious before.

Some families are very close, meeting up as much as possible and spending time like Christmas together. However, the other side of that coin is that others don’t see their families, talk to them or contact them on birthdays and anniversaries.
There can be many different reasons for this, sometimes involving childhood grievances, or arguments in adulthood resulting in distance and non-communication. Sometimes this happens after a parent died – he or she might have been the person who provided the ‘glue’ that kept the family together and once they’re no longer there, things fall apart. Support fo one another wanes and they feel like strangers to one another.
For some, they can cope with this, saying that everyone’s busy or that they have very different ideas about life in general – their politics, way of life, values and principles – and they accept that people are busy and, despite growing up together, they have little in common. There are so many ways that people can become estranged that it’s surprising that it doesn’t happen more often!

For others, it’s like an ongoing wound – they find it difficult to come to terms with the feeling of abandonment and hurt. When seeing clients, I came to realise that some families are very good at dealing with conflict – they discuss things, compromise and try to see things from each other’s points of views. With others, they’ve grown up in an atmosphere where arguments and conflict were never really resolved which means they haven’t picked up ways of dealing with different points of view without shouting and storming off!

If you’re someone who honestly wants to reconcile with your family, how can you go about it?

Forgiveness is a good start. This isn’t easy and you have to be sure that you’re ready for it – there’s always the chance of rejection and few of us want to put ourselves in that position. So, before you pick up the phone to take the first step, make sure you know what you want to say and acknowledge to yourself any part that you might have played in the situation.
If you manage to talk to your parents or siblings, take tiny steps. Don’t launch straight into what went wrong and start accusing them. Try general things, ask how they are and don’t react defensively if they seem aggressive.
Be patient – it took time to get to this stage and it will take time to recover.
However long the estrangement, people’s lives will have changed, whether it’s been weeks, months or years. Allow for that – they might have become more entrenched in their attitudes and, for that matter, so might you!
Keep reminding yourself what you want to achieve – communication and eventually meeting up might be the most to expect at this point.
Listen to what they have to say – you might not agree with them, but let them finish. Their feelings are important but if they shout, make it clear that you won’t tolerate that. You could say something along the lines of “I can see this has upset you and that isn’t what I wanted. None of it is easy, but I’ll ring again soon when we’ve both calmed down”.
If you say you’ll ring or write again in a few weeks, make sure that you do so – being consistent and reliable is vital.

These aren’t foolproof ways of mending bridges but they’ll almost certainly help if you want to work towards getting on better terms with one another again.

Are You Being Emotionally Blackmailed?

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There are often challenges, even in good relationships, and there can be times when people take advantage of you. They break boundaries and becoming controlling, sometimes without really realising that they’re doing so.

This can be the case whether it’s with friends, family, a partner or online but if you depend on these people for emotional support, it can be very hard, chipping away at your self-esteem. Going into a new year, the Christmas holiday might have highlighted how your own feelings and needs don’t seem to matter and you realise that you don’t want to carry on like this. If you’re asked to do something that you’re not keen on you and then feel pressurised to agree with whoever’s asking you, and particularly if this happens on a regular basis, then chances are that you’re being emotionally blackmailed. In other words, emotional blackmail often means that someone who’s close to you uses any feelings you have about obligation and guilt to get their own way.

This can include:

You feeling as if you’re tip-toeing around them – if you try to reason with them, it causes friction and you start to cave in and agree to whatever they’re demanding.
They’re manipulative and although they can appear charming so that you’ll comply with whatever they want, they’re actually quite threatening and you feel as if you’ll be punished if you don’t go along with what they want.
Them guilt-tripping you – if you have a healthy relationship there’s give and take but with emotional blackmail it’s different. They take advantage of your generosity and good nature, saying things like “Is it so unreasonable that I want you to do this for me?” or “You obviously don’t think as much of me as I thought”. You then feel that their demands are almost reasonable and that you’re being selfish.
Them never seeming to give up – it happens a lot and they keep repeating their behaviour until your own self-esteem is at an all-time low.

So, if you’ve started to recognise this pattern and want to make changes, how can you go about it? Changing patterns of your own behaviour isn’t easy but this is what it will take because the person or people who are using this tactic will rarely stop of their own accord. So, here are a few strategies to start you off:

Begin by putting down some boundaries – recognise that you’re good enough as you are without complying with every unreasonable demand made of you. Practise assertive responses such as “I can’t do that this time” and keep repeating it to yourself before trying it out when people are pressurising you.
Explain that they’re not taking you seriously and that you need to be treated with respect.
Find supportive friends that you can confide in, telling them how you feel pressurised, and work to wards feeling stronger and more confident.
If trying to reason with them doesn’t seem to be working, try to distance yourself from them so that you’re no longer in a vulnerable position.

Wish You Were More Resilient?

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I think most of us would answer “yes” to this question but what is resilience? The Oxford Languages definition says that ‘it’s the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness’. Even that is subjective though because what counts as ‘quickly’ can differ from person to person.

Another way of putting it is that mentally resilient people have certain traits that help them to cope with adversity; maybe it’s about learning valuable lessons from what seem like impossible setbacks and finding ways to get on with life despite problems and issues along the way.

Still, we all have bad days when things seem to get on top of us but if you often wish that you could ‘ride the storm’ when you face obstacles rather than feel anxious and depressed, how can you change that?

One way is to self-monitor, meaning that you have an awareness of your feelings and thoughts. It’s possible to regulate your feelings according to whatever the situation demands but this means being proactive about issues, reaching out for help – in other words, taking responsibility for your actions and seeing how what you do affects other people too.
So this is about accepting the consequences of your actions and choices, rather than adopting a victim role, blaming others for problems that you may have caused yourself. Sounds harsh? Well, it’s also about being self-compassionate during hard times whilst knowing that you’ve made an effort and done your best in often difficult circumstances.
Another way to change things is to try to see things from other peoples’ perspective and deal with what is actual reality rather than what we speculate is the case but has no substance. In other words, recognising the difference between internal feelings and what’s happening in the outside world.
This means adjusting your responses to the particular situation, looking for the more positive consequences rather than the negative ones. Not easy, but also not impossible.
Another part of becoming more resilient is dealing with the past and recognising that some situations and feelings that you’re experiencing now might stem from years ago. Maybe one of your parents often viewed things negatively or and this is what you learnt to do to. There may have been life events that affected your family in a very difficult way and these have meant that you now expect the worst outcome in situations that arise. Being able to process these events means that they don’t accumulate into disappointments and trauma and you can start seeing life from a new perspective.

As I’ve said before, changing things isn’t easy and takes determination and in the case of resilience and feeling more positive, learning different ways of coping can make a real difference.