The Best Top 10 Life Hacks List

Hello,

It's Sunita here.

The Way Back Home.

Do the Right Work.

Do your Work!

Comparing yourselves to others will not help you.

Trying to find your salvation in the advice someone else gives you is futile.

Trying to gleam life through a 'Top 10 Life Hack Tip' list of a celebrity guru is nonsense.

We have to walk on our own path to find our truth.

It is who we become on that journey that gives us the 'hacks' we long for.

But they are not hacks.

They are garlands made of insights, wisdom, failures, lessons, wounds, glory, empowerment, confidence, swag, and experiences that we have earned on our way back home.

No one can offer those to us.

Only we can.

What someone else can give us are markers to look for on that journey.

Those who are in the position to offer us such valuable information will do so with utmost humility and grace and with the disclaimer that they know very little.

Because they are busy in their own quest and know that we all know nothing so must try to make meaning out of what we experience.

So, do the right work. Do your own work.

Until next time,

Moving forwards,

Sunita

#TWBH #The Way Back Home #uniquely yours #do the right work #do your own work #do the work #humility #grace #mental health #growth #thriving #healing

How You Can Offer Support to a Grieving Loved One if You Don't Know What to Say

Hello,

It's Sunita here.

We often struggle with what to say to someone who has experienced the death of a loved one.

A very dear friend of mine recently lost his partner of 30 years to cancer. My initial reaction to the news was a whoosh of so many emotions.

Initially they threatened to overcome my thinking brain that wanted to console him. I took a deep breath and sat down to experience my feelings with an open heart. I understood they were there to help me move forward in an authentic way.

I also knew that my reaction to his loss came with my grief for him and sadness for own my life losses.

I know how much death hurts so felt deep empathy for him.

I tried to think what would I need to hear if I was him at that time. These words came to mind.

So, I timidly and humbly offered them to him with this private prayer-

"Please God, don't let them be the wrong words."

They weren't.

He kept saying the words to himself throughout the next few demanding and heartbreaking days of the wake and funeral when things threatened to take him down.

When his son felt physically overwhelmed with the intensity of his grief on losing his mom my friend shared them with him too.

These words became their mantra.

These words strengthened them.

These words gave them permission to be weak, broken and sad while remembering they are strong, majestic and amazing.

These words are now my mantra too.

Maybe I wrote them because I needed to hear them?

If you have someone who needs to hear this affirmation, I hope you will share it.

We all often forget that,
We are strong and weak
We are sad and can laugh
We are broken and majestic
We are amazing!

This Permission gives us Freedom.

Embracing the complexities of the human experience and the tough but beautiful business of being human is what thriving is all about.

Moving forwards,

Sunita

#TWBH #The Way Back Home #SLSCF #we are amazing #grief #affirmations #showing up #death #cancer #thriving #healing #the healing process #mental health #depression #anxiety #anxiety awareness

Why We Must Treat Society as a Patient of Attachment and Childhood Trauma

 Hello,

It's Sunita here.

Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) are now commonly talked about in our society. But I feel that there is more progress to be made in how we approach these conversations.

We are often sick but don't always know that. 

We can't recognize our own impairment. 

We will, in my opinion have to treat society as the patient because I don't see a sweeping transformation happening to reduce the occurrence, severity and widespread nature of this trauma. 

Instead, I believe we will need incremental changes to our understanding of the origin of this trauma that will lead to systemic healing. 

Otherwise we will continue to have a dialog in which there is only a perpetrator-victim narrative. 

I am not at all suggesting that adults should not be accountable for causing harm to children (in most cases it's their own offspring who they harm.) But I believe we need to look beyond a generation, two or more to understand how someone came to be a 'perpetrator'.

As a culture we must become more capable of making the difficult choice of talking about trauma in a way that is honest, compassionate and transformational.

Then we must continue to find and devote the resources for the systemic changes we need to make to stop this blight of our times from taking us down as a society.

How does one narrate attachment trauma and ACEs from the inside out?

This what I think of in my waking and non waking hours.

Until next time,

Moving forwards,

Sunita

Photo above- My first day of grade 1- Lethbridge, Alberta

#attachment trauma #childhood trauma #transgenerational trauma #suffering #neuroplasticity #healing #conversation #mental health #thriving #healing #ISTDP #dynamic psychotherapy #unconscious

A Life Saving Practice

Hello,

It's Sunita.

It has taken me many, many years to learn to love myself. I finally now treat myself in a way that is gentle, kind, forgiving, and with delight and a celebratory affection.

But only with practice have I been able to cultivate an unconditional regard for who I am.

Playing it safe was never my game. I have always been pushing to be, achieve, and accomplish things.
Sadly, I was pursuing all the wrong things for me. And I was doing a pretty good job of it.

I felt exhausted carrying the load of impersonating someone I did not relate to. Tthat’s how far off I was.

Eventually my soul cried out for help.

It took a tremendous amount of effort (which is ongoing) to turn the sinking Titanic that was my inner life around. For me, Davanloo’s Intensive Short Term Dynamic Therapy (D-ISTDP) was what connected me to my unconscious and helped me access my before trauma self.

On my way back from the world of despair, depression and darkness, I learnt that Self Love Self Care First is the only way I can stay true to myself, care for others, and actualize myself joyfully.

You may think- she’s all about herself.

That’s exactly the opposite of the WHY of SLSCF. More on that later. 

On the contrary, with SLSCF I’ve become deeply connected to myself and to those whom I love and have produced my best work in service of others so far.

The sway, imprints, expectations and pressures from society, family, trans generational trauma, a single incident of violence/trauma, our culture, our inner conflicts, our deep need to be accepted as part of a group, our personality- and so many more complex factors contribute to us becoming someone who we are not.

This can also manipulate us to pursue dreams ‘assigned’ to us, leaving us feeling_________. 

You can fill in the blanks here for yourself.

We end up not loving ourselves in the backdrop of all the shrieking voices of others that we hear. They that tell us who we ‘should’ be, how we ‘should’ act, what we ‘should’ look like, what we ‘should’ be doing for them, and a million other ways to ignore our true selves.

Self Love Self Care First is a Life Saving Practice.

Here’s to loving ourselves and the journey that gets us there.

Moving forwards,

Sunita

#TWBH # The Way Back Home #SLSCF #self love self care first #self love #self care #trauma #ACEs #depression #healing #ISTDP #Davanloo #mental health #wellness #thrive #Practice

 

I Am Enough And I Am More. Is This a Paradox Or a Conundrum For You?

Hello,

It's Sunita here.

I Am Enough

 And 

I Am More. 

Can both these statements be true?

Can you grow from a place of self love for who you are at any given moment of your life, including when you have hit rock bottom?

Can you accept these seemingly opposing concepts without internal conflict?

Do you only grow because you find yourself impatient, dissatisfied, disgusted, and perhaps even secretly hate yourself?

Maybe.

But is change and growth fueled by such self hatred going to come at a cost to your life?

How would your growth feel like if you could find compassion, acceptance, and deep understanding for how you became who you are first?

What would that discovery and unfolding of your potential look like if it was fueled by self love and self care?

How would your journey of self actualization be different than the one that comes about from a sense of inferiority, negativity and comparison to others?

Can you believe you are enough without losing your edge and ambition?

Can you love yourself completely AND accept that you have more to become without pain, shame or guilt?

I know it is possible. 

The Way Back Home exists.

There is a process of getting there and a practice that is the key to staying there.

Until next time,

Moving forwards,

Sunita

#TWBH #The Way Back Home #SLSCF #Self Love Self Care First #do the work #You are enough #you are more #paradox #thrive #transcend #trauma to transcendence #healing #fulfillment #self actualization #self love #self care #growth #growthmindset

Longing to Belonging

Hello,

It's Sunita here.

If you are
Feeling lost.
Feeling disconnected.
Feeling imprisoned.
Feeling stuck.
Feeling hopeless.
Feeling powerless.
Feeling overwhelmed.
Feeling unseen.
Feeling unheard.
Feeling erased.
Feeling insignificant.
Feeling useless.

If you are,
Missing yourself
Know you are somewhere under all your confusion.
Feel yourself under who you had to become just to get through life.
Are aware of your truth under all the lies you've had to hear about yourself.
Know you are more than who you have been allowed to be.
Have been bravely pretending to have it all under control.

Then I hope you will keep coming back here as I unfold what I have been working on for almost a decade.

In the meantime, know that you may need, and certainly deserve professional care if you are feeling all/any of the above. Please make that call today. You are worth it and there is help available for you.

And finally, please, please hear me when I tell you how precious you are to me and the world, and how deserving you are of kindness, love and compassion. You are significant and I see you.

So, I hope you will start today by giving yourself a big hug. 

You are enough exactly as you are at this very second.

Moving forwards,

Sunita

#TWBH #The Way Back Home #longing #belonging

Silently Suffering Men- Are you One of Them?

Hello,

It's Sunita here.

There are many studies that convincingly demonstrate that the impact of ACEs (childhood trauma) has definite gender differences but my blog is not about statistics or studies. 

It's about what I know and me sharing that with you. 

It is about what I have discovered through the filter of who I have become, as I continue to learn from my lived experiences of attachment trauma, ACEs, struggle, treatment, healing and my commitment to stay on the road to recovery. 

I ask,

• Are men silently suffering from the impact of childhood trauma/trauma on them?
• Is the societal expectation for them to be strong and successful in emotionally damaging ways taking its toll?
• Are we allowing men to be vulnerable enough to ask for help?

No. 

I don't think so.

I say this based on the many conversations I have had with men over the past few years.
We have a considerable amount of work to do before there is an culture shift that encourages men to let their guard down and admit they are at the brink of a break down.

Men and women often manifest the impact of their trauma in different ways that are gender expectation based as well as manifestations of actual gender differences. ACEs (by age 5) are related to psychological distress differently for boys and girls, with ACEs being related to both internalized and externalized psychological distress for boys, while ACEs were mainly related to externalized distress for girls.

Childhood trauma has been linked to higher rates of addiction and incarceration in both men and women. 

But according to Addiction Center, men typically are more likely to abuse illicit drugs and alcohol – 11.5% of boys and men over 12 have a substance use disorder, compared to 6.4% of women and girls. However, women are more likely to go to the emergency room or fatally overdose due to substance abuse. 

Also, according to the most recent numbers published by the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP), 93.2 percent of the approximately 185,500 federal inmates are men, and only 6.8 percent are women. 

Men may also over achieve, over exercise, and even over earn to fit into the masculine image they feel is asked of them by society. They may adopt self sabotage and self punishing behaviors that have high social validation. This creates a loop of desperation and imprisonment, all in the effort to distance themselves from their emotional pain and suffering.

Males who have a history of ACEs commonly shy away from being in intimate relationships and seeking attachment with others, find exaggerated self worth in their accomplishments, and may be addicted to activities that are sanctioned by society like overworking. High rates of completed death by suicide is merely the tip of the emptiness iceberg of men's long standing and silent suffering.

In November 2019, in the blog 'We Must Give Men and Boys a License to be Emotional Because it's a Matter of Life or Death' I wrote,

"Our culture does not allow boys the opportunity of deeply engaging in openly emotional relationships with each other. There is a strong stereotype of boys being less emotional than girls. That is not true. It is almost impossible for young boys to express tenderness and vulnerability with each other without being labelled gay, girly or weak. This cultural taboo has resulted in a social isolation in boys that persists throughout their life as an edict of what it takes to be a man." 

The consequences of disallowing or discouraging openly emotional relationships between boys are serious and oftentimes deadly.

In a recent article, Most young men are single. Most young women are not, Pulitzer Prize–winning writer and journalist Daniel de Visé  shares an alarming statistic. 

"More than 60 percent of young men are single, nearly twice the rate of unattached young women, signaling a larger breakdown in the social, romantic and sexual life of the American male."

When we consider how important good relationships are to having a happy, healthy and meaningful life, this does not bode well for men.

Are we allowing men to be vulnerable enough to ask for help?

We can start by asking that question to the men we love. 

Even better, we can teach our sons, nephews, brothers and friends early on in life that being vulnerable is an act of courage, not cowardice. And we can help make our society be more empathetic and compassionate by encouraging and facilitating them to freely Acknowledge and Accept our Yearning for Love.

Every one wins when we are all free to seek love and a rich emotional life of openness with our friends and family.

If you are not feeling well, I urge you to ask for help.

Help is Available. 

Speak with someone today.

988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline

Hours: Available 24 hours.

Languages: English, Spanish

Learn More 988

Take great care of yourselves!

Moving forwards,

Until next time,

Sunita

#TWBH #the way back home #men's health #trauma #depression #men's health #mental health #help me #SLSCF #self love self care first #you are worth it #addiction #addiction recovery #ISTDP #davanloo #dynamic therapy #recovery