And I think people just genuinely feel discomfort when people are sad around them. So they think that they have to come up with these exceptional things to say to get you out of here. or sadness. And in oftentimes it gets us to a point where we even feel more sadness around the words that they say, I was working with one of my clients this week that's been having a lot of judgment for herself around how she's feeling about the holidays. And she shared her sadness with one of her girlfriends, who was trying to, I think, make her feel better. Her friend said, when she was talking about how she was, you know, really dreading the upcoming holidays, and just really looking forward to them. Her friend was basically telling her not to forget why we celebrate Christmas, that it has nothing to do with having a child and writing letters to Santa or Christmas shopping or sitting on Santos lap, but it's a celebration of the birth of Christ. And that she should really stop focusing so much on the fact that she's sad about being childless. So we got to talking about this in our session. And when we got to the nitty gritty of what was going on with those words that were said to her, we identified that she was thinking that she should be handling this differently. And when she's thinking that she should be handling it differently, she's feeling embarrassed. And from a feeling of embarrassment, she's downplaying her feelings. She's clamming up, she's judging herself. And she's not letting herself feel her feelings. So as long as she's thinking, I should be handling this differently and feeling embarrassed, she doesn't handle or confront her feelings. And so she's almost setting herself up for this constant avoidance of her feelings and embarrassment for her feelings. Because she's simply telling herself that she should be doing something differently. And if you are a client of mine, or know about the way that I practice, in my coaching practice, you know that you are always in control of how you want to think, and how you want to feel. And people can say whatever the hell they want. And it may be from a place of empathy, or not, or they may say something that's really heartless and comes off very hurtful to you. But regardless of what words are said to you, you always have control of how you interpret the words that are said to you. So as we continued on in our session, we really worked through some alternative thoughts that she could have, instead of thinking I should be handling this differently. We decided that a better thought would be, I'm doing the best that I can. And when she's thinking the thought, I'm doing the best that I can. She's feeling so much more compassion for herself. So she's feeling compassionate. And from a sense of feeling of compassion, she can then just get curious about why those words are bothering her, not judge herself, and when so when she's getting curious and not judging herself. She's truly putting herself in her needs first. So it's just the opportunity, we have to just evaluate the thoughts that we come up with in our mind. And just get curious about the thought and play a little bit with deciding is that a thought that's useful to me is that thought, creating the feelings that I want to have on a daily basis. Because as long as you give your operative opportunity to think and feel to somebody else, for words that come out of their mouth, you're always going to be held hostage by others. And not taking control of the life in the feelings and the emotions that come along with we being humans. So when it comes to the holidays, and if you find yourself feeling sad, feel sad.
