Soothing is a natural instinct. When I think about the word soothing, what straight away comes to mind is making other people feel better when they are sad. Indeed, most of us are familiar with the concept of soothing other people. A really obvious example of soothing is our reaction to a baby crying. Naturally we tend to find it pretty uncomfortable to hear a baby crying for an extended period of time, and when faced with this situation we tend to do things to try to calm or comfort the baby, like pick him or her up, rock, cuddle, and so on. Additionally, if someone we care about is noticeably upset or afraid, we naturally try to do things to make them feel better. We all know the power of a good hug!

I see all too often people invalidating their own emotional experiences. How often have you told yourself you shouldn’t feel something because of one reason or another? Maybe it’s “I shouldn’t feel upset because there are starving kids in Africa” or “I shouldn’t feel disappointed with my friend for letting me down because that wasn’t their intention”. With these kinds of thinking patterns, we are left feeling guilty for experiencing our emotions. But why should we feel guilty for having an automatic emotional reaction to something? After all, it is no great sin to feel things!!

Envy. It’s such an icky word. Why? Well, I guess we have so many negative connotations associated with it such as the seven deadly sins, and thoughts and feelings of ill will, hatred, hostility, etc. Envy is something that is often misinterpreted as jealousy. Let me repeat that. Envy is often misinterpreted as jealousy.

Ah mindfulness. It certainly is a word that most people sadly cringe at or roll their eyes at. We’ve heard it so much and yet people talk about how helpful it is. So then why is it so hard for so many of us to practice it?

Recently I got thinking about the concept of resilience, as it occurred to me that resilience is a term that I use a lot - that we all use a lot – but that I didn’t actually know a lot about. In my mind, resilience was about ‘bouncing back’ when faced with adversity but I had a hunch that there was much more to learn about resilience, and I was right.

Autumn is my favourite season, and this past week in particular has felt like autumn is set in and winter is on its way. This changing of the seasons brings memories of autumns past and the way, here in Melbourne, we spent them in lockdown. Now however, more than a quarter of the way into 2022 we’re living life without lockdowns and I’m listening to people talk about what a joyful, celebratory time it has been. Socialising and activities are back, most can work from the office at least part time, people are travelling and schedules are full again.