Hi everyone, it's Keisunga.
Just a reminder that you can listen to all of our podcasts ad -free on the Headspace app.
Hello my dear Headspace community, it's Robin and hosting with me today are Rosie and Headspace Therapist Ryan and we will be answering questions about trying not to judge peers who are able to travel more and afford more and how to not give friends too much advice.
We also have a question about how to handle hopelessness in extreme situations such as navigating Venezuela's challenging political and economic landscape.
These are all important questions so let's get right to them.
Have you ever wished you had a wise meditation teacher on speed dial?
Or a therapist you can call after a long day?
Or a mental health coach you can lean on for advice?
Someone to help you see things differently.
Welcome to Dear Headspace, a podcast where I sit down with Headspace experts and we answer your questions.
Alright you two, the R's are back in the house.
We got Rosie, we got Ryan, we got Robin.
Dare I say it, a dream team?
Yeah, that felt like this.
Yay. Really excited.
No, super excited. I couldn't think of a better crew to join.
I mean, that's what I love about this show.
It's like the rotation, it's like always different, always interesting and all of them lovely.
And all of them with like a different flavor.
Yeah, it's like a variety pack.
You never know what you're going to get.
Alright you two, I would just love to jump straight into our questions today because they are big ones.
So here is our first question from Joanna.
Hello, my name is Joanna and I come from Poland.
I meditate with Headspace daily since more than one year already and it makes my life really better.
Recently I experienced a situation when a young friend of mine was very hard in her relation and I found myself talking to her so much and I felt it was not right.
Do you have any thoughts about how to be supportive to somebody without giving too many advices?
Thank you, goodbye.
Oh, what a lovely question.
And like when I heard this when I was like, yeah, I was like, I am so guilty because I think when she says too many advices, I believe she means too much advice.
I'm so guilty of like over advising.
I mean, like my poor children, they're like, I just wanted to say how I felt.
Yeah, I just recently, a couple months ago, read Charles Duhigg's new book called Super Communicators.
I don't know if either of you have read it.
No, I haven't. It's really great and it's basically talking about how to be essentially a better communicator.
And one of the things that stayed with me, one of the biggest takeaways that I learned from not only the book but also in having two different conversations with him was how important it is to tell the other person that you're actively listening to them, that you're acknowledging what they're saying.
Right. And so, I mean, Ryan, you know this too, like as, you know, working with somebody in a professional capacity.
Right. So I'll give you an example.
As you're talking to somebody or they're expressing some sort of situation, the whole idea is that you acknowledge and repeat what they're saying.
For example, Robin, if you're saying to me, I find myself that I tend to talk at my kids a lot and I'm just like giving them advice.
And I'm noticing that maybe that's frustrating for them.
You're expressing yourself to me, then I'm supposed to say what I'm hearing you say.
It's like coming couples therapy.
Yeah, what I'm hearing you say is that you feel like perhaps you are, you know, relaying too much information to your kids and you're sensing there's a little bit of frustration.
Maybe you're a little frustrated yourself.
Did I get that right?
And then you respond to me yes or no, and then we can continue the conversation.
Because at that point, then you feel validated in your own experience.
Ultimately, when people come to us, they want to unload, they want to release some tension, they want to feel heard and understood.
And I think that that's one of the best ways to do that.
I love that. I also have a friend who, like, before she's a fixer like me too, or she's very like, you know, going 100 miles an hour in her head, and she'll start to give advice and then she'll go wait, she'll go, did you want did you want to just like unload right now?
Or did you actually did you want advice?
And it's like the most like the first time she did it, I was like, oh, no, no, I actually do want to hear your advice.
And then like, but there have been times where I'm just like, no, I just actually want to be like, this feels really unfair.
And I want to just kind of whine a little bit.
You know, it's interesting, and I'm curious for both of you, and purely purely just from my human perspective, I like the sort of precursor to the conversation.
When you're with somebody that you trust to say, I just want to vent, or I really want advice from you to have that self knowledge or that self awareness.
I found for me it was really difficult for many years, because I was such a people pleaser, that I never wanted to say what I actually wanted.
Really? Yeah, that's interesting.
I mean, I almost want that always want the advice.
And then at some point, we'll let Ryan talk.
I almost always want the advice.
But I'm modeling doing the listening part.
You guys do a great advice for it.
But it's like, I almost always want the advice.
But I also want the person to be listening to me as I say it, because like, sometimes there's those friends who will just be like, well, did you do this?
Or did you do this?
Or did you do that?
And then you're just like, I heard of this is pitching.
And part of this is like, I might be open to help.
But I was actually just telling you how I am.
And I'm struggling with x, y, and z.
It's like so I do think that can free up.
But I never occurred to me that someone might not feel comfortable saying.
Yeah, I don't want to hear what you have to say about it.
Yeah. So that's a good no as well.
Absolutely. Well, I think part of what we're talking about as we give advice on how to give less advice, right, is is sort of being able to have the self -awareness of calling yourself out.
Which I think both of you did of, hey, I think my tendency is to do this.
You know, I think sometimes we're afraid of asking the question of saying like, I think I want to do this.
I think my tendency when someone vents to me is to do this, but I don't actually know if that's what you want right now.
So by kind of calling that out before you rush in with help, you get to empower that other person, as Rosie said, to self acknowledge.
Actually, I don't even know what I was looking for when I just vented all that out.
But now I'm thinking about it.
And I actually would really appreciate your perspective on this problem.
So great. So now that's been established.
And now we can move forward in a lined way.
That's actually going to be helpful for you.
That's so interesting, because I do think sometimes people don't actually know what they need or want.
I know I don't sometimes, especially when I'm upset or triggered.
I don't necessarily know what is I'm doing.
And the other part of this is, if you don't know, then we get to discover it together.
We don't have to operate from my assumptions about how I think people feel better when they're sad, angry, stressed, whatever it might be.
And we see this especially in things like grief, anger, where the person who, in most cases, has really good intentions and just wants to help you feel better or make that bad feeling go away, they're going to operate from their biases and what they think helps them and they're going to tell you to
do that. Right. But if we rush in with that advice, we don't even know if that's a helpful thing or not.
Yeah. Our couple's therapist said that to us once.
She was just like, oftentimes people give the help that they are looking for, but it may not be the help that the other person needs or wants.
And I know I do that.
Like Mary and I have completely different needs when it comes to how we want to be taken care of.
And so that's taken me a long time to be like, oh, she's not looking for me to get mad on her behalf.
She's actually looking to to feel hurt or whatever.
And it's like, but my my I want to just like run in and be like, I'm handling things.
And that's not always what she wants.
So I think that's a really good point.
Yeah. And Joanna, if I can give you another question to ask instead of feeling like you have to give advice, you know, you as therapists, we try to help people come to their own conclusions and be their own expert.
So sometimes a good question is, you know, what solutions are you considering?
What have you thought might be helpful?
What does your gut tell you, right?
So now you're allowing them to explore a solution that probably feels more natural to them.
And it might be advice you would have given them.
It might not be. But now we're helping them feel like they can solve their own problems, not that they didn't want your advice, but that they have solutions within them, too.
That's fantastic. I mean, I think what we learned here is that it is all about communication and refining it and that I think I'm doing it all wrong.
So thank you for that.
Both Ryan and not all of it.
Just just half, half to three quarters.
But good luck, Joanna.
We're with you. And I do have to say on a serious note, the fact that you care so much and you want to help your friend in this way, I think is just really lovely.
And I join Ryan and Rosie in applauding you for that.
So good luck with everything.
Okay, let's move on to our next question from Sarah.
Hello, my name is Sarah.
I live in Pennsylvania.
I am a recent college graduate and I'm in the job market, which is obviously pretty stressful.
I am seeing a lot of my friends or people my age traveling the world and seeing all these new places.
My boyfriend and I recently moved into an apartment.
So now we have rent.
And I just feel like there's so many things that I want to do that I don't know how other people have the financial ability to do at the same age.
I know I'm forming stories of what things should be or how things should be or what other people are doing.
But how could I be mindful in this and not judging my situation where I'm at and comparing my situation to others feeling like I should be doing more.
Thank you. Thank you so much for your question, Sarah.
I mean, first of all, I just want to say you're doing great.
I mean, just graduating college, moving into boyfriend everything's you're doing great.
So applaud yourself for that.
But I did also need to say that this reminds me of the Friends episode where half the gang can afford stuff and half the gang cannot and they're all feeling taken for granted and it all blows up over a hoodie and the Blowfish concert.
Anyone? As all things do.
Totally. What do you two think?
I've always said that comparison is the greatest killjoy.
And I know that that's a very known quote and people say it all the time.
And even though we know it intellectually, it's very difficult not to compare ourselves to how somebody else is doing or what somebody else is doing.
And I find that if I'm feeling some type of way about it, if I'm feeling a little sad or discouraged or like I'm not enough, etc, etc, I often find that there are things I'm doing like scrolling on Instagram or I'm on, you know, doing something that's exposing what is not happening in my life and bringing
it to the forefront of my present moment.
And what I found helpful for me was if I was feeling like I was on a spiral, downward spiral, I would limit the use of those comparison tools so that I can give myself some respite.
There was a teacher that I worked with that would always tell me when you compare yourself to other people, you're comparing your insights to somebody else's outsides and you're always going to lose because you're comparing something that you think is an idealized version of whatever that thing is.
And it might not be that, but in your mind, so internally you're thinking that it's like this amazing experience, right?
It's very similar to those, again, just referencing social media, those places on Instagram that you see there so idyllic and it's like Instagram versus reality.
So I really like that as the barometer to having this experience for her.
And Sarah, I really feel, you know, that I can hear the desire to want to do those things, but you've made different choices.
And I think that that's really great.
You and your boyfriend have made a choice to create a home together and that's really exciting.
And there might be people who are looking at you in your life thinking, wow, like, I wish I had somebody that I could build a life with, I wish I had somebody that I could, you know, move in with.
And not to create a disparity between I have more, you have less, or you have more, I have less.
It's just looking at it from a mindfulness perspective, how do we even the playing field and the way that we even the playing field is by staying in that present moment awareness.
Having gratitude for what I have in this moment, the fact that I have a roof over my head and food in my home and that I have my health and that I'm able to do so much more and then catch yourself when you're going down the spiral of comparison to say, my life is unique and it's special and I get to
live it. And having that framework observing when you start comparing yourself and bring yourself back to the present moment.
That's why tools like mindfulness and meditation are so powerful, especially when you tend to compare yourself because your mind will escape and create this narrative that might not be true.
But when you catch that thought and you bring yourself back to the present, you can remind yourself again of what you have and how unique this moment and this life is for you.
And hopefully that begins to create a less, less of a charge when you start to see friends or people around you that are traveling the world or doing X, Y, and Z things.
Yeah, Sarah, I think you have so much really valuable self -awareness already.
You were talking about forming stories about how things should be.
And Robin and Rosie, I think you guys would agree.
Should language, most of the time, is inherently judgmental, right?
Uncomfortable at the least.
Yeah, absolutely. And you think about, you know, I often come back to like the language that we use towards ourselves, right?
If I say to myself, I should really eat healthier, that doesn't sound like someone who's internally motivated to make a healthier choice.
That sounds like someone who is judging themselves for not making a healthier choice.
But that's not me wanting to eat healthier, right?
That's just me feeling bad about it.
So for Sarah, when you say, oh, how things should be, if it's, oh, we should be traveling more, we should be having more fun, we should be living larger, well, then I think, Rosie, to your point, it's not only are you not focusing on what you have and what you're building and the values that you're leaning
into, but from that sort of deficit mindset of like, we don't have these things and something must be wrong or something we must be failing or struggling, all these judgments on top of the things that you don't have.
Now, it's a completely different statement to say, we want to travel more.
Yes. Well, great. Right.
Right. Right. That's true.
Now, that is something we're excited about and we're looking for opportunities to make that happen.
Yeah. Right. Pennsylvania, not too far from me.
There are wonderful places you can travel to that hardly or don't cost any money at all.
And you can with that sense of shared desire, we want to travel more, explore what that looks like for you in a way that actually fits your budget, your lifestyle, your goals, all those sorts of things.
And then it becomes something you're excited and internally motivated about as opposed to just sort of feeling bad about what you're not doing.
Yeah. I never took a promotion at my day job, my like main, main day job.
I would never take a promotion.
And I watched people that I came up with who were like SVPs and EVPs and like these salaries and these bonuses.
And then I would have to remind myself that I chose voluntarily to not take promotions, that I could have had that if I wanted that, but that didn't fall in line with me pursuing what I was pursuing as an artist.
And so it's like sitting down and like reminding yourself of why you're making these choices and what you're doing and what you're getting, almost like a little gratitude action of getting in there and being like, no, like, yeah, no, I'm not going to France this spring, but I do have this.
We're saving toward this and these align with the things that I want.
But I am feeling a little bit like, ah, we haven't left in a year.
So like, could we get in a weekend and still keep the goals that, you know, because I, and that ties in with what you're saying, Rosie, too, about the comparison factor.
It's like when you start comparing, you're losing sight of the things that you're here and doing that you want to be doing.
I think in the struggle, it's easy to forget, oh, I'm choosing this.
Yeah. There's choice in it.
And there's a reason.
And I'm excited about it.
Like that can get lost in a struggle for me anyway.
Yeah. Those choices are coming from values, right?
You don't know if those people are putting all their travel on credit and not valuing their financial stability.
Right? Absolutely. Right.
So, so Sarah, you might be making decisions that are based in wisdom.
And sometimes that's the thing that gets lost is, well, I wish I could be more spontaneous or more frivolous sometimes and just throw caution to the wind.
But if that's not what you want to do, then that's not what you want to do.
And that's okay. Well, I'm full circle back to Sarah.
You're doing a great job.
That, let me be the beginning to, you know, of you saying that to yourself.
You're doing a great job.
You're doing great.
Okay. We'll be right back.
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Hi, I'm Lale Arakoglu, host of Women Who Travel.
This summer, we visit a remote Danish island with strong Viking roots.
So I think it was also part of the history you told yourself with strong women here, with strong women.
This is the culture of this island.
We've crossed the country with a baseball stadium chaser.
Some games could be a day game, and then you drive to your next location and take in a night game.
And then you turn around and try to get to a day game.
And, well, how can it be summer without at least one mouthwatering moment in France?
I'm in a country where there's all these wonderful cheeses and fruits, and I tasted a white nectarine and it was small and ugly.
But it just had a sweetness and a juice that shocked me.
Join me, Lale Arakoglu, every week for more adventures on Women Who Travel, wherever you listen.
All right, now we've got a question from Nelly.
Hi, my name is Nelly.
I'm really from Venezuela.
I would love to ask about trusting the process when you have lost all the hope.
As of right now, we're going through a very tough political situation here in Venezuela.
And I'm visiting my family.
I have to go back now where I live.
And thinking about leaving them here and eventually, you know, trying to come back.
But that might not be possible given that we have a very tough situation.
That breaks my heart.
And honestly, we have lost all kind of hope of these changing in the near future.
I would love to know how to navigate hopelessness and, you know, work through that.
Thank you so much. And I really appreciate your work.
Thank you, Nelly. I mean, I speak for everyone.
I just say we're so sorry that you're in this situation and your family's in this situation, your country's in this situation.
It's just it's difficult.
And you're and you're asking a very big question.
Even if we come out of Venezuela, you're talking about, I mean, one could apply that to perhaps a political divide in the United States.
One could, you know, to wars that rage on like that, that hopeless feeling of something that's so epic and how to change it.
And I know many people are in this in this space right now.
So I'm just really thankful that you asked this question.
Yeah, Nelly, I want to say that I I my heart goes out to you and to your family.
And I really hope that they are safe.
And the only thing I mean, it's it's so tough, right, because I think when you have family members that come from or that are in a war torn country, it makes things very complicated because you want to help.
And it feels like this behemoth of an issue that you just feel like there's no way that one person can make a difference and it can feel very hopeless.
So I want to acknowledge you, Nelly, for calling us and expressing your feelings and your frustrations and your worry.
I would love to say here are three things you can do to make that feeling go away.
But I just the only thing that I could offer is for you to give yourself space, give yourself compassion.
I just keep going back in my mind and my heart to loving kindness, to just do what you can obviously be there for your family.
There's so many practical things, right, because from a survival perspective, there's no amount of us talking that's going to make things better right now.
Like there's nothing we could say right this second to alleviate a situation happening in a war torn country.
I mean, I wish that we could and maybe I'm wrong, but like I think it's really important for us as individual to recognize our humanists, to recognize our suffering and to be able to offer presence as much as we can.
And it's hard. When you're dealing with a situation like this, you're in fight or flight, right?
So you're just in this exalted physiological state.
And so I would imagine that you're utilizing meditation and you're obviously listening to this podcast and you're trying to find that sense of relief.
And I really hope that you give yourself that respite by doing a loving kindness meditation.
And I love that meditation so much because obviously loving kindness, the sort of nexus or the sort of foundation of loving kindness meditation is this idea that we send well wishes, health and happiness to yourself.
You're sending it to others and it's essentially creating this reciprocity of gratitude, this reciprocity of well -being and ultimately it makes us feel more connected.
So that's what I would offer.
Yeah, I was thinking I had a conversation with this guy, Bill, who runs this thing called the Optimism Institute.
One of the things that he talked about when things are large scale like this is just focusing on your circle of influence, like the people and the things close to you that you can make a difference on.
Because if you come to the macro, you're just going to go down.
It's overwhelming. It's overwhelming.
There's probably nothing that could be done, but maybe there is some impact, whether it be for your family or friends.
But it does feel like to your point, Rosie, a little hollow, which is why I'm glad you're here as well, Ryan.
Like, from the coaching and the therapy perspective, what else can Ellie do?
Yeah, so Robin, you're absolutely in the right space here with that circle of influence point, because if we boil hopelessness down to it doesn't matter what I do, nothing's going to change.
If that's the sort of core belief that we might hold when we're feeling hopeless, the only way to build momentum out of that is to give yourself evidence of the opposite, that it does matter what I do.
And I think sometimes when people make hopeless statements in therapy, sometimes we'll push back on that and say, okay, it's not that it doesn't matter what you do.
And it's not that there's nothing you can do for your family.
It's that the thing you want to do, which is might be to rescue them or save them or help them move or overthrow the government, like the thing you want to do is not something you can do right now.
That doesn't mean there's nothing you can do.
And that doesn't mean you can't do something that they would like or appreciate or that would be helpful for them.
And when we remind ourselves of that and lean into action, it's not that there's nothing I can do.
It's just that the thing that I can do is not feeling as helpful as I want to be.
That's okay. And that's where we lean into this is sad and this is hard or this is upsetting.
It makes me angry that I can only do this.
But when we hold on to the emotion and still act, that's what hope ultimately is going to look like, because if we think about what that mirror is reflecting back to us as we go about our day.
Well, if we look in the mirror and we see someone who, despite incredible, difficult circumstances, is still acting, is still reaching out, is still writing letters, is still showering and eating and taking care of themselves and meditating.
Then we see someone who, despite the circumstances, is still acting.
So we see someone who's hopeful, who is resilient, who's hardy, who's able to still do hard things under hard circumstances.
And Rosie talked about the loving kindness meditation, which is one side of self -care, but what else can Nellie be doing?
Because my instinct is to say, Nellie, you better also take care of yourself in this.
Of course. You better put the oxygen mask on yourself.
So what else can Nellie be doing to take care of herself while she's in this state?
Yeah, I think when we, so we'll do a lot of feelings identification, right?
So it's hopelessness.
But what else is it?
Right. Is it sad? Is it angry?
And we need to identify what our needs are from those different emotions because it's different.
You know, we'll pull out feelings wheels in therapy and say, OK, you need to be as specific as possible, because one thing to say, I'm exhausted, right, which might be a very broad way of saying, I can't do anything else.
I can't take on anything else.
But if we spin that wheel and we start to look at the very specific type of emotions that might be inclusive inside that exhaustion, we might find hungry.
Right. We might find lonely.
We might find scared.
Right. And when we find those specific emotions, well, now there are maybe more specific solutions for those more specific emotions.
And then when we can identify that, we can say, OK, is this something that I can can I meet this need on my own?
Can I get myself something to eat?
Yeah, probably. But maybe loneliness is a little bit harder.
Maybe I need to reach out to people.
Maybe I need to reach out to family in Venezuela because that is the part of the puzzle where we have to determine what we can do for ourselves, even if it is reaching outside of ourselves when we're hopeless.
I mean, sometimes that's the hardest thing to do when you're feeling that way.
No, I love that, Ryan.
And I just want to add to that allowing yourself to feel the way you do is also healing, even if, Nellie, if you just say to yourself, it's OK to feel this way.
I think that that's a really, really great way to care for your mental well -being as well, to not feel bad about having these these big feelings.
Well, Nellie, we are just we're sending all of the love your way, all of the love and for you and your family and for the whole country.
I mean, it's like it's tough times.
I mean, there are many, many, many, many, many people suffering these days.
So we'll all do a little loving kindness meditation.
Well, I want to say thank you, Rosie and Ryan, for your insight, because I am just I'm always so aware of how lucky I am to have you guys here and to help.
Navigate what are often just trying situations.
So just thank you to you both.
Thank you. And thank you, listeners and callers.
We wouldn't be able to do what we do without people being willing to to ask and listen.
Yes. Thank you. Thank you all for your questions.
And it's always just such, such a great experience to be here with all of you.
And for those of you, all three of the questions today really brought me back to loving kindness.
And if you are interested in doing a loving kindness meditation or learning more about loving kindness, you can go to the Headspace app and search loving kindness and you'll get all kinds of different loving kindness meditations, podcast talks.
And yeah, maybe try it.
Oh, that's a great suggestion, Rosie.
I was also thinking about the collection in the app called For Challenging Times.
It's all about emotional care for processing world tragedies and injustices.
But there's also Headspace now offers mental health coaching and it's right in the Headspace app.
And it's so simple to sign up.
You're going to sign up, you're connected right away with a trained expert, someone here like Ryan, who after we hit stop record, I'm going to tell him all of my problems.
And it's going to he's going to help work with you.
Someone like Ryan is going to help work with you to plan and reach whatever your unique goals are.
Yeah, that's right.
It's a pretty great offering.
It's something I'm grateful to be able to offer that service to people as well.
And it's live. It's one on one care and support from anywhere, anytime.
So definitely consider it as an option.
Yeah. It's just another option to add to your toolbox.
And I think we said it before, but we want to say thank you again to our callers today, Joanna, Sarah, Nellie, just for trusting us with your questions.
And you know, if you're listening and you'd like to ask a question on Dear Headspace, all you have to do is head to say hi dot chat slash Dear Headspace.
Follow the prompts to record your question.
And you know that link is right in the show notes.
And if we use your question on Dear Headspace, you're going to get three months of Headspace for free.
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We love free. We love free.
And we have just one more thing before we leave you today.
We've built in some time to allow you to move from this moment to the next thing in your day.
This is a moment to take everything that you've heard here to process everything and give you an opportunity to just breathe before moving on to the next thing in your day.
So here are the peaceful sounds of water running under a bridge.
As you listen, let your mind do whatever it wants to do.
Until next time, stay happy, stay healthy and be kind to each other.
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