Ep. 53 Coping Skills to Manage Anxiety & Other Difficult Emotions in Midlife: Naming (Part 1)

Creating Midlife Calm: Coping Skills for Stress & Anxiety in Family, Work & Relationships

Stop Trying to Feel Better and Get Better at Feeling? This pithy statement, credited to Whitney Johnson, sums up this episode. Did you know the average feeling moves through us in 90 seconds? EXCEPT, most of us disrupt this natural process by avoiding, minimizing, maximizing or soothing our emotional reactions because at about the 30 second mark feelings kinda SUCK. So, instead of tending and befriending our feelings we blame or unclaim them and do something to lessen their intensity. You know-- blame someone, eat chips, smoke a joint or two or three or binge on Netflix. In this two parter, MJ will share with you the simple method her and 50 middle school students came up with to Name, Tame and Aim our emotions. They called it potty training their emotions which helped them not to crap all over the place! In this episode, MJ and a regular listener do Step #1:Naming our Feelings. Potty training our emotions takes a bit of knowledge and bravery and a willingness to slow down and be curious when our body gives us the signal that a feeling needs to be peed out! It is impossible to have healthy self-awareness without a process to regulate and understand what information our emotions are giving us-this is a foundational to Mental Wellness! Check out the show notes where MJ shares her one pagers to help you visualize this Mental Wellness Tool!!!!!!
https://mjmurrayvachon.com/podcast-6/
https://mjmurrayvachon.com/podcast-7/
Creating Midlife Calm is a podcast designed to guide you through the challenges of midlife, tackling issues like anxiety, low self-esteem, feeling unworthy, procrastination, and isolation, while offering strategies for improving relationships, family support, emotional wellbeing, mental wellness, and parenting, with a focus on mindfulness, stress management, coping skills, and personal growth to stop rumination, overthinking, and increase confidence through self-care, emotional healing, and mental health support.

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About the Host:
MJ Murray Vachon LCSW is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with more than 48,000 hours of therapy sessions and 31 years of experience teaching her Mental Wellness curriculum, Inner Challenge. Four years ago she overcame her fear of technology to create a podcast that integrated her vast clinical experience and practical wisdom of cultivating mental wellness using the latest information from neuroscience. MJ was Social Worker of the Year in 2011 for Region 2/IN.
About Inner Challenge:
Inner Challenge was created in 1995 as a summer camp for girls, and spent 20 years being tested and "refined" by junior high students who insisted on practical Mental Wellness skills that made them feel better. Inner Challenge has been used in many businesses, and community organizations. In 2017-2018 Inner Challenge was a class for freshman football players at the University of Notre Dame. It was these students who encouraged MJ to face her fear of technology and create a podcast. Inner Challenge will soon be a Master Class available for those who want to stop feeling like crap.

To connect with MJ Murray Vachon LCSW, learn more about the Inner Challenge or inquire about being a guest on the podcast visit mjmurrayvachon.com.
Creating Midlife Calm is a podcast designed to guide you through the challenges of midlife, tackling issues like anxiety, l...