Like a lot of people, I’m pretty sensitive.  In fact, I’ve spent a lot of my life fighting a perception that I’m “too sensitive,” including my own opinion of myself.  But what I’ve come to believe is that being sensitive is a powerful asset and the world actually needs more sensitive people!  They are often kind and compassionate and able to show a lot of empathy and caring.  But to be honest, there are times I wish I could feel things a little bit less and maybe have a little more choice in how my feelings affect me.  Just like there is nothing wrong with anger, as long as we use it constructively, I suppose there is nothing wrong with being sensitive as long as we don’t allow it to control us in reactivity.  This week, to my own surprise, I had a real lesson in this experience and it inspired me to want to write about it.

As sensitive people, we tend to have quick access to our feelings and they can be intense.  If we’re not careful, we can be triggered by our strong responses and it can color our perceptions and sabotage our being able to be present and enjoy ourselves.  While these feelings can be important messages to what we need to pay attention to, sometimes we need to be able to let things go and NOT feel so strongly.  One tool for doing this is a process called psychological distancing, meaning detaching from your experience and stepping outside of yourself in your mind’s eye.  Research and clinical experience shows it can help with emotional regulation, problem solving, decision making, and alleviate anxiety and depression.  Psychological distancing is a way to get unstuck from a feeling and find a new way to relate to a situation, often giving you a sense of power and relief.

Last weekend I was visiting my daughter who is taking classes on campus this summer.  I was having a great time until my return flight was canceled due to Hurricane Henri, which led to a series of stressful travel arrangements involving a much earlier flight, little sleep, long hours waiting in a crowded airport with angry passengers in a pandemic, and airline staff overwhelmed by things beyond their control.  I was irritated and feeling sorry for myself, sad to lose precious time I had planned with my daughter and feeling victimized by a Hurricane that was depriving me of her. But then I saw a man who looked calm and even happy.  He was wandering through an exhibit at the airport and actually seemed delighted.  Intrigued, I joined him.  The exhibit contained some interesting artifacts representing the history of flight.  While viewing these items, I found myself suddenly feeling lighter.  My goodness, I thought, what a miracle it is to fly!  How incredible it was that I could even visit my daughter at all, let alone for a weekend.  In just a few hours I could travel entirely across the country, a journey that not so long ago in history would have taken months to do at great peril.  Suddenly, to my surprise, I didn’t feel like a victim, but I felt lucky.  And my flight became a delight as I was filled with gratitude at the opportunity.

In the span of literally a few minutes, my attitude and experience of the very same event changed dramatically.  The shift in perspective helped me distance from my own emotions and see a broader perspective, one much more pleasant.  And this is the benefit of psychological distancing.  By taking a different perspective, I was no longer a victim, but a person experiencing something.  How I chose to interpret this experience had flexibility.  Yes, it was sad that I missed out on time with my daughter, but it was also amazing I could be with her at all.  In distancing, we can step outside our current experience and allow for other possibilities.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not suggesting it’s usually this easy.  In fact, sometimes it’s really hard to separate ourselves from our reactions, especially if we’re in conflict with someone and feeling overwhelmed.  Some tools to help with this I found in perusing the literature include imagining you are stepping outside yourself and watching yourself from a distance.  Another tool is literally leaning back.  Research shows that when we physically lean back it gives you a psychological sense of distance from a situation (isn’t that interesting?  We naturally tend to lean in, which limits our vision and perspective).  You can take this even further by imagining you are moving even farther away, either from someone else or your own feelings.  And finally, you can shift your perspective by imaging yourself in the future thinking back to how you would like to be in that moment.

All of these tools are meant to create a boundary between you and your feelings at the moment. Their purpose is to create space to allow you to HAVE feelings rather than BE your feelings.  But to use any of these tools, the first step is to realize you are needing to get space in the first place.  You need to notice you are experiencing something and also be aware of a desire to have more control over it. This takes an awareness that just by itself will create some space.  And one last tool that I find kind of awkward but effective is to talk to yourself in the third person.  Research shows that this can instantly create psychological space and in my opinion, helps you take yourself less seriously.  “I’m not sad and annoyed, it’s Cynthia that is sad and annoyed.”  And boy do you want to watch out for her, she is so sensitive!

Every four years we get to watch the best athletes in the world come together for the Olympics.  I am always inspired by their dedication and sacrifice and am amazed at what they are able to make their bodies do (can we even be the same species?).  But as I get older, I find myself less focused on who won the gold and more interested in the extraordinary circumstances of what some athletes have to do just to get there.  In this post I want to share an example that really struck me this year in teaching me lessons about the value of the journey over the destination and how success is absolutely relative. 

The Refugee Olympic Team first competed in 2016 in Rio.  In response to the global refugee crisis displacing millions of people, the International Olympic Committee partnered with the United Nations Refugee Agency and sponsored the training and selection of an Olympic Team for those without the benefit and security of a home nation.  This year in Tokyo the Refugee Olympic Team marched second behind Greece in the opening ceremony, carrying the Olympic flag.  The team consisted of 56 athletes originally from 13 countries including Afghanistan, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of Congo, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Iran, Iraq, Morocco, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, and Venezuela and competed in 12 different sports. 

Each member of the Refugee Team has experienced a type of stress and hardship that few of us can ever imagine. Every athlete has had to flee from war or persecution and lives in exile.  Needless to say, their conditions for training and participation in their sport have been most challenging.  Their daily lives consist of a constant uncertainty and anxiety about what is happening to both family and country.  For most all of these athletes, the reality is that there is little chance they will win a medal. Their victory is in the resilience that was required to compete at all. For example, one athlete, Aker Ai Obaidi, fled from his country of Iran at the age of 14 because of war.  He was separated from his family and had to learn a new language and build a new life in Austria, fending for himself and worrying if his parents had survived.  His sport of wrestling gave him an identity and a way to find routine and peace.  Of his motivation to compete, he is quoted as saying:” I’m trying to give voice to show that refugees are not bad people.” Another Refugee Team member, Yusra Mardini, actually had to use her swimming skills to pull a waterlogged boat with 18 other migrants and refugees from Turkey to Lesbos.  She and her sister fled Syria when their house was destroyed in the Syrian Civil War.  After surviving the sinking boat, they traveled by foot through Europe to settle in Germany.  She says of her inspiration to compete: “Life will move on. Life will not stop for you because you have pain, no.  You have to move on.”

What the participation of these Olympians reminds me is that each of us starts from a different place in life. Some of us are less fortunate than others in terms of resources, stability, and support, and yet, all any of us can do is play the hand we are dealt. When you’re raised in an alcoholic home or experience a major loss or illness, these traumatic events do have consequences.  And yet, we so often compare ourselves to others and wonder why we haven’t won the gold. We judge ourselves harshly and wonder what’s wrong with us.  We seldom allow ourselves the pride of resilience and a fair congratulations for the distance we have indeed come.  Each of our journeys are unique and our challenges cannot be compared.  As one woman I work with who grew up in a neglectful home put it, “when you start out a half a mile behind, you need to realize how much you’ve accomplished just by catching up to the pack.” 

Now, if like me, you’ve been inspired by the Refugee Athletes in overcoming their challenges in order to compete, take note.  The Paralympics are just about to get underway! (August 24 – Septemer 5)

It started as a curiosity.  My father-in-law, John, being a laser physicist, wondered about the nature of light and matter.  He designed an experiment in his head pondering what would happen if light were trapped in a mirrorred box.  He so enjoyed the process of his wondering that it has now spanned a 20 year journey culminating with a complex theory, formulas, a book, several papers, and a feeling of exhilaration in proposing new ideas to a field of physics that has been fairly stuck for over 100 years.  Beyond the major accomplishment of slowly developing the confidence and ability to address the unanswered questions of Einstein’s work without a PhD or institutional support, it is a pleasure to witness John’s growth. In watching my father-in-law through the years, I have seen his quest expand from a mere question, to an obsession, into a genuine sense of life’s purpose. His journey has been a great lesson for me in how a sense of purpose is so important to living a life full of meaning, connection, and well being.

Stanford psychologist William Damon and his colleagues define a sense of purpose as “a stable and generalized intention to accomplish something that is at once meaningful to the self and of consequence to the world beyond the self.”  While research has shown the personal benefits to those with a strong sense of purpose, such as a lower risk of death and an overall sense of happiness, its benefits are caused by a sense of the opposite of personal gain, but a connection to something bigger.  I remember well when John had a health emergency several years back.  While being wheeled into the room for a significant procedure, his request to my mother-in-law if something were to happen to him, was to please publish his work.  Now at the age of 80, he maintains his vitality by sharing his work for further exploration and the excitement in having made a contribution to the field he loves.

Besides a fulfilling sense of connection on a grand scale, having a sense of purpose reduces daily stress.  Those with purpose wake up with a plan of what to do each day, reducing boredom, isolation, and time spent dwelling on other matters compared to people who report a low sense of purpose.  A strong sense of purpose also makes people less vulnerable to anxiety, depression, and substance abuse.  And a sense of purpose can come from many different sources besides theoretical physics.  You can get it from volunteering, painting, gardening, or caregiving.  What seems to be the necessary ingredient is a pull to thinking outside of yourself and getting lost in a process that feels good just in the doing of it.  Related to this, purpose is closely linked to “flow,” the state of intense absorption in which we forget about our surroundings and ourselves.  People with a sense of purpose experience flow more frequently, and as Mihaley Czikszentmihalyi’s research shows, flow is a powerful source of well being.

Finding purpose, many psychologists believe (including me), is such a cornerstone to mental health and yet it can be elusive.  We have all heard stories about the great athletes who stop playing the game and become depressed and alcoholic.  Or the people who retire after a long and successful career, only to feel a sense of emptiness and isolation.  Experts in the area of well being encourage us that often your sense of purpose can be found in the world right around you when you begin to look for what matters to you.  They suggest reading books and articles that interest you, looking for organizations that have meaning for you, and putting the time into focusing on the things you are already doing that you wish you could do more of or that bring you awe or gratitude. 

And don’t be afraid of the pain!  Often purpose can come from making meaning out of painful events in our lives or requires taking risks in offering ourselves and our creations to others.  Rejection will happen along the way.  Even John, who was at times dismissed or discouraged because of his lack of accepted credentials by those in the field’s inner circle, has had to stay persistent and determined, often needing to reject his rejectors.  But quite frequently the fresh ideas comes from an outsider’s perspective.  And while, Lord knows, I will never have the capacity to know how to evaluate John’s theories for their scientific accuracy, I am certain the process of his creativity has produced something we all must take notice of!

For those brave enough, here are the article and video links:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/353049276_A_quantum_vacuum_model_unites_an_electron’s_gravitational_and_electromagnetic_forces

https://www.quantizedwave.com/