Noticing, Pausing, and Returning the the Present

Self-awareness is a critical and necessary skill for progress and change: we have to know when our mind is pushing us to do the things that keep us stuck in unworkable patterns. Awareness allows us to create space between triggers and responses. Otherwise, our mind will always be ahead of us (over-protecting/preserving). It is not enough to logically understand awareness as an idea: awareness is a skill that must be practiced regularly regardless of how good/bad or motivated/uninterested we feel. This often emphasizes self-monitoring, mindfulness, perspective-taking (sense of self, others, the world), and developing flexible attentional and observational skills.

Without self-awareness, we are on autopilot (i.e., the mind and your feelings take over), which can lead us astray and toward more problems and suffering.

Understanding Personal Patterns & Programming

As self-awareness establishes, our observations give us insight into why or how our patterns emerge. When we zoom out and draw in more connections, we start to see how patterns are interconnected with other patterns and problems. This process focuses on understanding the interconnected patterns of your mind, body, thoughts, feelings, and actions. Exploring the roots and consequences of these patterns helps us become aware of what changes need to occur to progress with our goals and live aligned with our personal values. It shines the light onto distorted narratives and beliefs we may continue to hold onto out of fear and protection.

Without insight in life or therapy, we may find ourselves trapped in repetitive cycles, unable to break free from unhelpful patterns and unaware of the underlying causes of our struggles.

Dropping the Struggle with Our Inner & Outer Worlds

Acceptance is not simply about needing to like something—it is totally natural to feel frustrated. angry, or sad… But it doesn’t usually work to stay frustrated, angry, or sad. Acceptance is both a vital skill and process of letting go of what is not within our control, moving away from what’s not serving us, and developing willingness to make space for all of our feelings to understand what they are communicating (e.g., what we care about, how we should act, what we should do). The process of acceptance strengthens our ability to allow our thoughts and feelings to come and go on their own while we reinvest our attention, energy, and time into what matters.

Without openness and acceptance, we struggle with “control” and feelings of discomfort and pain (even in the face of meaningful growth): we obsess over how things should be or how we want to feel. Rather than accepting, we rely on avoidance, numbing, denial, anger, etc.

Guiding Choices by What Matters (Not Just What Feels Good)

Do you know what motivates you? What drives you to act the way you do? Do you know which direction you are moving toward? And are you truly honest with yourself about whether what you’ve been doing is working or not? Our freedom to choose in the modern world can sometimes be a curse, as the “options” we now have to deal with our psychological issues create larger problems in living. As we begin to learn more about ourselves, where we currently are, and the gap between where we would like to go, we begin to consider what specific things need to change and how to prioritize that. This process emphasizes gaining clarity around our true values and selves: who do we want to be, what do we stand for, what type of quality do we want to see in our choices/actions (especially when life is challenging)?

Going through life or setting goals without knowing our values often leads to pursuing externally prescribed goals to be fulfilled and happy: become the most powerful, beautiful, rich, successful, perfect, provocative… We lose our true selves and become stuck pursuing goals that leave us feeling more disconnected and discouraged. We take valuable motivation and energy and waste it on “junk” goals.

Taking and sustaining action is not only my favorite part of therapy—it might be the most essential driver of real, lasting change. A huge problem with solely using therapy as a space to vent is that—without integration (doing or thinking differently based on insights from therapy sessions)—we not only stay the same… We keep responding to our problems the same way. Therapy is a process of creating personal “software” updates. But if we never hit “install” or actually use what we explore in session, we go absolutely nowhere. Effective action can be virtually anything that moves you closer toward your true values and needs: pursuing goals, modifying behavior, practicing new responses, and recommitting when or if you fall off. Action bridges knowing to doing/being, providing us the necessary exposure to generate different thinking, feelings, responses, and lived experiences.

Without action—whether through avoidance, procrastination, or emotional resistance—we keep running on “old software.” And if we keep using the same code, how can we expect to get different results? We fall back into familiar patterns, not because they work, but because they’re predictable and don’t demand the effort or discomfort that change requires.