we have some normalized stereotypes:molly Ringwald
we need new romance writers
Bechdel Test
MASCULINITY in film
and we are taught stereotypes of other people
and reinforcing gender roles
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types of friendsCasual friends: acquaintances, people that you know from school or work that you don't have deep conversations with. Close Friends: people you might be more inclined to share your childhood stories, dreams, concerns about life, goals, and beliefs with. Friendship includes:
The best way to be compatible with great friends is to be a great friend. Check yourself and everything else will follow, hopefully, check for reciprocity. Friends listen to each other and support each other, it is however, alright for a friend to set boundaries and ask you to not vent as much or talk about a difficult situation as often. You can go over what you are doing to resolve the issue or focus on self care and then talk about other topics. One can become overwhelmed by a friend's problems; especially if they truly care and would like to fix everything but know that doing so is not possible. Share the time with your friends wisely, there are many other things to talk about and distraction can be a constructive part of self care. Talking to a counselor can lead to the best support available, they have gone through training to know how to navigate difficult conversations. Friends of the opposite sex: A friend can be of the opposite sex, this has been problematic in our history due to ideas around gender norms. We know that people of all genders are the same and can share interests, world views and perspectives. What matters is that you respect each others' boundaries. It is completely alright for you to keep your friends if you enter a relationship, only an abusive partner will try to tell you that you can no longer speak to your friends, no matter what their gender is. datingpg 148 Infatuation: Intense feelings of attraction toward someone, a normal experience, we call it a "crush". Many people meet up for activities like bowling or practicing a sport, dating often grows out of group activities. dating helps us learn more about the other person's personality, interests, abilities, and values, it is a healthy a way to get to know them better while staying in a public place. Group activities can help you see how the person:
After a date they may decide that they would rather keep spending time with the group or that they would like to have both group and date activities.
healthy relationship
EMOTIONAL INTIMACY
PHYSICAL INTIMACY
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REMEMBER THAT YOU ARE VALUABLE, YOU DESERVE LOVE AND YOU DESERVE RESPECT. ABUSE IS NEVER YOUR FAULT AND YOU CAN ONLY TRY YOUR BEST AND HOPE FOR THE BEST
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victim blaming
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Victim blaming occurs when the victim of a crime or any wrongful act is held entirely or partially at fault for the harm that befell them. The study of victimology seeks to mitigate the perception of victims as responsible.
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it can happen to anyone, any gender
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DATING VIOLENCE
The Cycle of Violence:
There is generally a three stage cycle:
Tension Building:
Violent Episode:
Calm Stage:
There is generally a three stage cycle:
Tension Building:
- The person going through the abuse may try to prevent a violent outbreak by doing what the abuser wants, or reasoning with the abuser.
Violent Episode:
- The tension is broken and the abuser behaves in a way that leads the survivor to feel unsafe.
Calm Stage:
- Abuser usually apologizes and says that it won't happen again, presents excuses and expects the survivor to eat it all up and move on as though it never happened.
- The abuser may subtly blame the victim for the abuse.
WARNING SIGNS OF ABUSE
- Person is jealous when you talk to others
- Makes fun of you in front of others
- Makes all the decisions and tries to control what you do
- Has a history of bad relationships
- You feel isolated from your friends and family
- You feel less confident, you worry about doing or saying the right thing, you try to avoid arguments
- Any pushing or jokes about hurting you
Many movies show abusive behaviors as romantic.
- Sometimes we are taught that aggression is a sign of masculinity or that men are entitled to control women
- Sometimes we are taught that if we are not the abuser we will be abused
It is ok to break up with someone, you don't owe them an explanation, if you tell them how you feel and it is not helping because the person does not help, it's ok to just cut them off and surround yourself with good friends.
grooming
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RED FLAGS OF ABUSE:
SIGNS: HTTPS://STREETSMARTWOMEN.COM/
resources
https://teenlineonline.org/
https://www.thetrevorproject.org/
https://www.loveisrespect.org/
https://www.fyinm.org/
https://www.mentalhealth.gov/get-help/immediate-help
https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/
https://www.thetrevorproject.org/
https://www.loveisrespect.org/
https://www.fyinm.org/
https://www.mentalhealth.gov/get-help/immediate-help
https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/
how does family health connect to social health?
This topic is complex because there are so many possibilities for family dynamics and what well being can look like. Our book covers some of the changes that we have seen in recent years, on pg. 113 it goes over the rising presence of women in the workforce. More than half of women with pre-school children work outside their home, sometimes as single moms, over 86% of single parents are women.
family vocabulary
nuclear family- a couple and their children
Adoption- the legal process through which a couple will take another persons child into their family
Single parent family- only one parent lives with children
Extended family- group of close relatives living together or near each other, grandparents, teachers, uncles, aunts, or cousins
Blended family- when parents remarry and children from both parents live together
Foster family- when people take care of a child when their biological family is not able to take care of them
Adoption- the legal process through which a couple will take another persons child into their family
Single parent family- only one parent lives with children
Extended family- group of close relatives living together or near each other, grandparents, teachers, uncles, aunts, or cousins
Blended family- when parents remarry and children from both parents live together
Foster family- when people take care of a child when their biological family is not able to take care of them
RESPONSIBILITIES WITHIN THE FAMILY
All members of the family are meant to share responsibilities, chores and responsibilities can be adjusted according to age.
Youth can help with cleaning and cooking regardless of gender.
Youth can help with cleaning and cooking regardless of gender.
family violence
- Violence can occur in all kinds of families-- rich or poor, urban or rural, at any education level.
- The heart of the problem is one persons' desire to have power and control over others.
- Violence may be physical, sexual or emotional
- Any member of a household can be the victim of abuse- a spouse, child, or elderly person
- Tell people what you are going through, you are not alone
- Physical abuse: when an adult punishes a child and leaves a mark that can be seen the next day
- A child that is going through abuse might think that changing their actions might stop the abuse but only the abuser is responsible for the abuse, any justification given is just victim blaming
- Sexual abuse: a criminal offense in which an adult uses a child for sexual purposes, even a single incident can cause long term damage where the survivor blames themselves even though it is never their fault
- Emotional abuse: non -physical mistreatment of a person, it leaves no visible scars but it can lead the victim to feel inadequate and worthless
- Neglect- failing to provide basic needs
- Runaway- a child who leaves home without permission, often times to leave an unhealthy situation at home
WHAT A HEALTHY FAMILY DYNAMIC LOOKS LIKE
pg 126
Caring and Commitment
Respect and Appreciation
Empathy
Communication
Cooperation
Caring and Commitment
- Committed to staying together through good and bad times
- When one family member makes a mistake, the other members of the family offer their support even if they are angry or disappointed
Respect and Appreciation
- Family members help each other feel important
- Celebrate success
Empathy
- The ability to understand how the other person feels
- Family members listen to each other's points of view
Communication
- Family members tell each other what they honestly feel
- they listen with respect to what the other person has to say
Cooperation
- Responsibilities are divided fairly among family members
- Each follows through with what they say they will do
unhealthy communication that can be, but is not necessarily abuse, it all depends on the situation
| Trust Yourself | It's a slippery slope: |
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telling the person how you feel about what they say to you should lead to them not being mean anymore,
if you are assertive and they don't care then you have an unhealthy situation
Calmly speaking up is worth it
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USEFUL SKILLS FOR FAMILIES
Resolving Conflicts: by focusing on collaboration and compromise
Expressing Emotions: being a safe space for elf expression is critical
Making decisions: as an egalitarian family unit where all members have an equal share in the decision making process
Managing Time: creating goals with timelines that are broken down into smaller steps so the members of the family can keep track of the progress
When the family needs help: family therapy, support groups, community involvement, individual counseling aside from family therapy
Expressing Emotions: being a safe space for elf expression is critical
Making decisions: as an egalitarian family unit where all members have an equal share in the decision making process
Managing Time: creating goals with timelines that are broken down into smaller steps so the members of the family can keep track of the progress
When the family needs help: family therapy, support groups, community involvement, individual counseling aside from family therapy
CONFLICT RESOLUTION
- Describe the problem:
- what do you feel the problem is?
- how does the problem make you feel?
- what do you think about the situation?
- what do you want out of the situation?
- See the other persons point of view:
- reflect of how you think the other person sees the problem
- Involve the other person:
- Ask them for their point of view
- Find ways to find a resolution that is good for both of you
as for new friends and strangers... here are some ideas on reading people
Remember that people can mimic the body language that they want you to see, they can look as "non-threatening" as possible to gain your trust, we don't know people until we communicate with them more and first impression is only on the surface.
Consider empathy vs sympathy in ourselves and in others
Consider empathy vs sympathy in ourselves and in others
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and then body language
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WHAT IS STRESS?
Stress is the response of your body and mind to being challenged or threatened.
- Positive stress is eustress
- awkward situations that help us grow, they cause stress but the result is beneficial for our overall well being
- getting to know someone
- telling someone that you like them and getting to know them more
- networking and connecting with possible employers
- competitive sports
- public presentations
- developing new skills
- preparing for bigger goals
- Negative stress is distress
- can be debilitating and reinforce fear, when we are not getting our needs met
- loss of a job or job insecurity
- loss of home
- loss of relationships
- hunger
- problems at school or work
- bullying or drama
- sleep problems
- Stressor: event or situation that causes stress
- Any change: some changes are harder to adapt to than others and some changes are harder to adapt to for one person vs another
- Prior experience with a stressor helps us adapt but it is best to find ways to make like less stressful.
- Each person gets to decide what stresses them out, nobody can tell them that their experience of stress is not valid
FOUR GENERAL TYPES OF STRESSORS
- Major life changes
- Graduating from high school
- Experiencing death of a parent
- Going through parents’ divorce
- Experiencing remarriage of parent
- Having a newborn sibling
- Having a serious illness
- Moving to a new school district
- Failing a grade
- Being accepted to college
- Breaking up with boyfriend or girlfriend
- Having parent lose their job
- Learning you were adopted
- Not making a team
- Being elected to student government
- Being recognized for an achievement
- Leaving home for college or a job
- Catastrophes
- It is and event that destroys lives and may destroy property
- Natural disasters such as hurricane, flood, earthquake, tornadoes
- Violent crimes and war
- A person who experiences a catastrophe may deal with psychological effects for years after the event
- Everyday problems
- Minor but frequent everyday events
- Misplacing keys
- Missing your bus
- Too much homework
- Disagreements with family members
- Pressure to succeed
- Competition
- Environmental problems
- Conditions in your immediate surroundings that increase your level of stress
- Overcrowded bus
- Traffic
- Noise if you live near an airport
- Poor air quality
- Contaminated water
- Heat wave or blizzard, unusual weather
- Living in an overcrowded space
HOW STRESS AFFECTS YOUR BODY
Stages of Stress:
Signs of stress, pg. 63:
- Alarm Stage: during the alarm stage, your body releases adrenaline into your blood, it causes an immediate change in your body: heart rate speeds up, muscles tense up, breathing speeds up, your attention narrows and you focus on the stressor. (Life hack [as long as alarm stage is not alerting you to something that you need to react to to save your life]: look at your surroundings and notice four items, take note of sounds around you, take your mind off the stressor)
- Resistance Stage: you feel that it is all good because the alarm stage is gone but you still experience the stress, you try to adapt to it and go by your day. Sometimes we react with bottled up, accumulated stress and [small things] set us off. Your body is working hard to cope during the resistance stage and you may be inexplicably irritated, tired, and less able to handle additional stress. Traffic is a common cause of this state or resistance.
- Exhaustion Stage: Your body can no longer keep up with the demands placed on it, depleted emotional and or physical state. this happens after a long time of resistance stage, it can happen when we lose a loved one. It is not permanent but it can last years.
Signs of stress, pg. 63:
- Stomachaches: can occur in stomach, small or large intestine. Stress disrupts the movement of food through the digestive system. Food might move too fast or too slow and you might feel gas, cramps, diarrhea, or constipation. Stress increases stomach acid making an ulcer more likely to occur.
- Breathing problems: Asthma may be triggered by stress, it also increases breathing rate and heart rate which can least to feeling short of breath.
- Headaches: Tension in muscles around scalp, face, and neck can cause aches, a migraine begins when blood vessels in the brain and scalp narrow which limits the supply of oxygen to the brain. You can keep a log to see when you experience aches.
- Lowered resistance to disease: Stress may lower your immune system, During the alarms stage some parts of the immune system function better than usual to protect you but prolonged stress can slow the immune system down.
- Heart disease: Your heart can suffer from prolonged or frequent stress because your blood vessels narrow and your blood pressure rises.
Responses to stress:
- Optimism and pessimism
- Aiming for perfection
- Resilience
TIME MANAGEMENT AND COPING
- It can help us feel less stressed out if we make a schedule and goals to work on.
- Break bigger projects into smaller steps and schedule when to complete the parts of your project
- Mental rehearsal- visualize the work getting done, practice the event without actually doing the event
- Reduce tension- activities that help us reduce tension vary
- exercise, walking, yoga
- watching tv or reading
- reflecting
- Create a safe space at home and think of what you need.
- It can be a desk or a part of your room.
- It can be part of a closet or bathroom
- More light? Books? Stuffed animals?
and check on negative thoughts
Automatic thoughts, thinking of the worst case scenario
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What is Love?
- We learn what love is through our culture
- There are some brain chemicals involved too.
Here is some science based explanation?
Some psychology based ideas:
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RECOGNIZING YOUR EMOTIONS
- It can be hard to identify our emotions
- Sometimes anger can mask fear guilt and shame when we don't know how to express our frustration; we might appear to be angry.
- Ask yourself what led you to feel the emotion, there s usually a string of events that lead to your emotion.
- Guilt and shame: When people in our life lead us to feel bad instead of being supportive we learn to feel guilt and shame, they could just give us ideas for alternative actions instead.
- It can be helpful to evaluate if we have a serious reason to feel the guilt or shame, but if we linger in these emotions we could feel down and will be less likely to seek constructive solution. Focus on solutions.
- Many times the shame is completely unnecessary and oftentimes based of ideas that we adopted about ourselves and that are not true.
- Sometimes abusive people try to train us to feel shame, it's brainwash.
- Sometimes they are projecting insecurities of their own.
- Guilt: does not help, forgive yourself and see how you can make it better
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Ego: a person's sense of self-esteem or self-importance.
The part of the mind that mediates between the conscious and the unconscious and is responsible for reality testing and a sense of personal identity.
The part of the mind that mediates between the conscious and the unconscious and is responsible for reality testing and a sense of personal identity.
setting healthy boundaries
Kati Morton, LMFT, holds a Master's in Clinical Psychology from Pepperdine University and is a certified dialectical and behavioral therapist and grief counselor.
"A healthy life is about keeping things in balance. I believe that personal boundaries are at the core of being happy. This video is about 5 ways to teach others how to treat us properly." --Kati Morton
Step 1: Notice when we reinforce the bad behavior of others
Step 2: Recognizing that we have the right to walk away from others
Step 3: Understanding that we have the right to say NO if something is not in our best interest
Step 4: Recognizing that we have insight on unhealthy relationships and acting upon that knowledge
Step 5: Sticking with it. Reinforcing our beliefs and acting consistently will help us to achieve our goals of being treated the way we want to be.
Coping with emotions
- Coping strategies help you process what you feel in a healthy or constructive way.
- Examples include:
- talking to someone who won't judge you,
- Taking a break by reading or going to an event
- Doing something nice to yourself to nurture yourself back to a state of equilibrium (be your own baby bird and baby bird caregiver)
- Do something new to break out of the usual routine, art or music, connect to your hobbies and things that you love.
- Unhealthy coping (Maladaptive Behavior) the options that you might want to talk to a counselor about, you are only trying to cope and can pick a healthier option instead:
- Doing drugs of drinking alcohol to forget the situation
- Overeating
- Excessive shopping
- Self-harm
- Taking excessive risks
- Excessive exercising
- Being mean to someone to feel above them
- Avoiding other people, sometimes by constantly being on the phone, or playing a video game to look busy
COMMON DEFENSE MECHANISMS
- Denial: refusing to recognize an emotion or problem,
- Acting as though nothing is wrong
- Compensation: making up for weakness in one area by excelling in another area
- Rationalization: Making excuses for actions of feelings
- Reaction formation: behaving in a way opposite to the way you feel
- Projection: putting your own faults onto another person
- Regression: returning to immature behaviors to express emotion
- Emotions can be stressful to understand and also be the result of stress.
- Sometimes emotions are good
- Sometimes we are stressed because we had good emotions before and are loosing the good feelings, maybe you are in love and are suddenly having to reconsider if being in love is a good idea because of something that happens.
- Having a good list of stress relievers that work for you is a good idea.
- If you find yourself using defense mechanisms, reflect on how you got there.
- You probably have a valid reason for feeling how you feel.
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coping
- Confront the situation
- Release excess energy
- Take a break
- Talk through feelings
The good coping skills include:
- Meditation and relaxation techniques.
- Having time to yourself.
- Physical activity or exercise.
- Reading.
- Spending time with friends.
- Finding humor.
- Spending time on your hobbies.
- Spirituality.
- Art: Music, poetry, drawing, painting, knitting, all creating.
the way you feel could be a sign of emotional abuse
Primary Emotions
- Happiness
- Sadness
- Anger
- Fear
- Learned emotion
MASLOW'S HIERARCHY OF NEEDS
Sometimes the way we feel is a response to our needs not being met
Hierarchy of needs
- Physical needs: food, water, sleep
- Safety: shelter from elements such as heat, cold, and rain, to feel safe from violence at home or in their community
- Belonging: connection with other people, we need acceptance and love needed for emotional health
- Esteem: approval, recognition, respect, appreciation, and attention
is there really a hierarchy? Or do we need all of these things at the same time?
gratitude
Thinking of what you are thankful for immediately puts you in a good state of mind. Telling people that you are thankful for their existence immediately puts them in a good state of mind, it is easy, and it is free.
EXPRESSING ANGER IN HEALTHY WAYSpg.42 in our book
- Accept your feelings: It is ok to feel anger, denying your anger will not make it go away, and ignoring your anger can lead to more destructive behaviors later on. Once you accept your anger you can work on expressing your anger in healthy ways.
- Identify your triggers: Know what makes you angry, it might be a particular person or situation, thinking about events in your past, or thinking about your future, you can write down what you feel in a journal. Know that your feelings are valid.
- Describe your response: Reflect on or write down what you did in response to your anger, and what happened after you responded. Reflect on whether or nor it helped relieve or process that anger.
- Find constructive alternatives:
- Talk about it: After you feel better, try to discuss the problem. Let the person know how you feel without blaming them, listen, with respect to what the other person has to say. Even if talking does not fix the problem, you may feel ready to move on and see if they stop doing the thing that made you angry. If you told them how you feel and they still continue to hurt you there is a possibility that they are trying to hurt you and you can consider setting boundaries with the person. You can chose to talk to them less or only in certain places such as school or work. You have the right to do whatever helps you feel safe.
- Release excess energy: Physical activity to get the energy out, even a walk can be very helpful but punching things (soft inanimate things) works too, there is also dance and hiking.
- Avoid certain situations: Leave a situation when you start to feel angry or change your activities if there is no other way to avoid the trigger.
- Avoid destructive behaviors: think of healthy alternatives such as art and music
- Ask for help: get feedback from supportive friends and family, look up community resources.
- Social issue anger: Start a nonprofit organization or get involved in the solution, support organizations that are part of the solution
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what is self esteem?
Confidence in one's own worth or abilities; self-respect.
Respect? a feeling of deep admiration for someone or something elicited by their abilities, qualities, or achievements.
Many psychologists think that high self-esteem has a positive effect on health, while low self-esteem has a negative effect on health.
It is on a spectrum, only you can really know how you feel. Accept yourself where ever you are at the moment and then treat yourself well, with self- compassion.
Respect? a feeling of deep admiration for someone or something elicited by their abilities, qualities, or achievements.
Many psychologists think that high self-esteem has a positive effect on health, while low self-esteem has a negative effect on health.
It is on a spectrum, only you can really know how you feel. Accept yourself where ever you are at the moment and then treat yourself well, with self- compassion.
Self-esteem refers to our sense of self-worth, perceived value, or how much we like ourselves.
While there is little doubt that low self-esteem is problematic and often leads to depression and lack of motivation, trying to have higher self-esteem can also be problematic.
Fragility:
Attempts to raise self-esteem may result in narcissistic, self-absorbed behavior, or lead us to put others down in order to feel better about ourselves.
We might get angry and aggressive towards those who have said or done anything that potentially makes us feel bad about ourselves.
The need for high self-esteem may encourage us to ignore, distort or hide personal shortcomings so that we can’t see ourselves clearly and accurately.
Our self-esteem can be connected to our latest success or failure, ups and downs are normal, it is ok to remain balanced and not judge ourselves harshly
We are constantly working to be better than ourselves, better than we were the last time we tried and work towards goals, knowing that we are doing our best.
self compassion
Self-compassion is extending compassion to one's self in instances of perceived inadequacy, failure, or general suffering.
- Recognizing that it is normal to not get it right away
- Listening to yourself and believing yourself as you wish someone would listen to you and believe you, you can journal to reflect on your thoughts, or just think
- It is ok to actively soothe yourself and alleviate your suffering by offering yourself what you would offer someone else to cheer them up and help them feel supported
- It is normal for thing to go wrong, we are constantly learning how to cope with situations that go wrong
- We suffer when we feel disconnected from others in our suffering, isolation is evolutionary considered very unsafe and we panic when we feel that perhaps our friend group wont like us, or won't be comfortable in a social setting any more
- It is good to consider how our actions can affect the experience of someone else before we act
- "Just acknowledge and validate how difficult the situation is" Dr. Kristin Neff
- Many people are better at supporting other than they are at supporting themselves so they know what to do, we just don't celebrate self-love enough
- Self-compassion allows one to see the related experiences of self and other without these feelings of isolation and disconnection.
"Instead of mercilessly judging and criticizing yourself for various inadequacies or shortcomings, self-compassion means you are kind and understanding when confronted with personal failings – after all, who ever said you were supposed to be perfect?" -- Dr. Kristin Neff
Self-Compassion is not self-pity
- When individuals feel self-pity, they become immersed in their own problems and forget that others have similar problems.
- They ignore their interconnections with others, and instead feel that they are the only ones in the world who are suffering.
- Self-pity tends to emphasize egocentric feelings of separation from others and exaggerate the extent of personal suffering.
- Many people say they are reluctant to be self-compassionate because they’re afraid they would let themselves get away with anything.
- “I’m stressed out today so to be kind to myself I’ll just watch TV all day and eat a quart of ice cream.”
- This is self-indulgence rather than self-compassion.
- Being compassionate to oneself means that you want to be happy and healthy in the long term.
- In many cases, just giving oneself pleasure may harm well-being (such as taking drugs, over-eating, being a couch potato), while giving yourself health and lasting happiness often involves a certain amount of displeasure (such as quitting smoking, losing weight, exercising).
three elements of self- compassion
Self-kindness vs. Self-judgment: Self-compassionate people recognize that being imperfect, failing, and experiencing life difficulties is inevitable, so they tend to be gentle with themselves when confronted with painful experiences rather than getting angry when life falls short of set ideals.
Common humanity vs. Isolation: Frustration at not having things exactly as we want is often accompanied by an irrational but pervasive sense of isolation – as if “I” were the only person suffering or making mistakes.
Mindfulness vs. Over-identification: We cannot ignore our pain and feel compassion for it at the same time. Acknowledge it, feel what you feel, and let it go. The pain does not define you, the experience does not define you.
https://self-compassion.org/the-three-elements-of-self-compassion-2/
Common humanity vs. Isolation: Frustration at not having things exactly as we want is often accompanied by an irrational but pervasive sense of isolation – as if “I” were the only person suffering or making mistakes.
Mindfulness vs. Over-identification: We cannot ignore our pain and feel compassion for it at the same time. Acknowledge it, feel what you feel, and let it go. The pain does not define you, the experience does not define you.
https://self-compassion.org/the-three-elements-of-self-compassion-2/
how do we comfort a friend?
Validation: let them know that their feelings are justified
Believe their experience
Ask them how you can support them
Believe their experience
- Sometimes we learn not to believe their experience, follow your intuition and believe your-self first
- Surround yourself with people you can believe and trust, it can be hard to know at first, we need to spend ore time with people to learn more about them
Ask them how you can support them
why is it so hard to love ourselves when that is all we need?
Some say that we give ourselves what we think we deserve, not what we actually deserve, we each deserve the best.
Sometimes we are taught that we don't deserve to be treated well and we need to unlearn that.
Oppression dynamics can lead us to believe that we don't deserve as much happiness as other people and we end up with internalized oppression
Sometimes we are taught that we don't deserve to be treated well and we need to unlearn that.
Oppression dynamics can lead us to believe that we don't deserve as much happiness as other people and we end up with internalized oppression
fleas in a jar
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Sometimes the past and limitations of the adults in our life lead us to hold ourselves back
Remember that everything is constantly changing and the experience of the adult is at lead over a decade old, there is still a lot you can learn from them, by remember that you might have more opportunities than they did, or live in a more loving world, thankfully
We walk around with other people's beliefs
People do things from their own level of rationalization, they feel justified in how the feel and say and do based on what they learned. Not your fault.
We might think that other people will only love us if we do certain things and feel that we are supposed to fit someone else's expectations .
Remember that everything is constantly changing and the experience of the adult is at lead over a decade old, there is still a lot you can learn from them, by remember that you might have more opportunities than they did, or live in a more loving world, thankfully
We walk around with other people's beliefs
People do things from their own level of rationalization, they feel justified in how the feel and say and do based on what they learned. Not your fault.
We might think that other people will only love us if we do certain things and feel that we are supposed to fit someone else's expectations .
body POSITIVity
All bodies are beautiful, capitalism just tells us to buy things to feel "better".
Yes, movies, magazines, and media have literally and consciously been emotionally abusing us to sell us stuff this whole time.
Yes, movies, magazines, and media have literally and consciously been emotionally abusing us to sell us stuff this whole time.
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how self esteem develops
- Childhood: Children need support and encouragement from family and peers
- Adolescent: It is normal to be a bit self-conscious, hopefully we won't judge ourselves too harshly, you deserve love from yourself, media tries to set "beauty standards" to make everyone look somewhat similar by buying the same products, peculiarities rule
- Adulthood: adults struggle with the same things youth do, don't let them fool you, encourage them to have a healthy self-esteem along with you instead
Personal Inventory:
- Make a list of your strengths and weaknesses
- Set ambitious but healthy goals for yourself
- Remember to not be too hard on yourself
- Rely on your values: what does that mean?
- Reflect on how you accept compliments
- Look beyond your own concerns
- Do not focus too much on appearance
Good ideas:
- Focus on gratitude: be grateful that you are who you are and think of the things that you already so for yourself, thank yourself for taking good care of yourself, positive self talk. Start with the present moment and recognizing all the good things that are already happening.
- Maintain a positive attitude: when possible, you don't have to do this all the time, it's ok to feel what you feel, focus on peace and whether or not what you do will help resolve an issue
- Focus on your strengths: ask yourself what you did well today
- Form close relationships: to the best of our ability, set your boundaries and respect the boundaries of others
- Set goals for yourself: if you have a really big goal, think of smaller steps that can help you reach that goal (more on that later), see if there are people that you can collaborate with
- Avoid risky behaviors: we all take risks but are you eating pizza off the floor or taking a mystery pill? Is there a chance that a dog peed where the pizza fell?
- Ask for help: resources are there for you, you can also ask your friends to crowdfund to replace your stolen bike or ask for tutoring
- Help others: see what people need, tell them to let you know how you can support them
we are on a quest for self- actualization
Self actualization:
- The ongoing journey of being happy with who we are and what we do on the planet.
- So we are just here to be ourselves
Personality traits of Self-Actualized People according to Maslow's studies:
- Realistic and accepting: sometimes we don't have all of these needs met so we focus on what we can do to be in a situation where the needs are met instead of being crushed by a reality that we are not completely happy with.
- Independent and self sufficient: bring your own supplies and take care of your own emotions, this makes it easier to be thankful for the support of others.
- Appreciative of life: recognize your opportunities and privileges and help foster a world where other people have them too. Recognize anything that is going well.
- Concerned about humankind: practice empathy, know that injustice is not necessary and support efforts to reach peace and equilibrium/ balance.
- Capable of loving others: realizing that other people are real and deserve love and respect as well as resources that will help them meet their needs.
- Fair, unprejudiced: reflect on how we have normalized oppression but don't need to continue to reinforce oppression, reflect on misogyny and misandry with an open mind.
- Creative and hard-working: We do not need to hold back from doing good work and showing that we care, we can always create something for someone.
- Not afraid to be different: When people are simply happy to be themselves.
- This can be tricky, sometimes we are expected to build up our self-esteem even though we don't have basic needs met.
- Many people work 60 hrs a week just to have their basic needs met.
- Sometimes our basic needs are met and moving up the self-esteem scale is still hard.
- Each person has a unique experience, nobody else can decide how you should be doing, mental health help is available and important
Resources:
What is Personality?
The way that we express who we are, the behaviors, attitudes, feelings, and ways of thinking that make you an individual.
personality traits according to chapter 2 in our book
- Extroversion vs Introversion: These words are used to describe polar opposites; we are not just one or the other and we might behave differently in different situations.
- If you just met a group of people, you might want to get to know them a bit better before you talk to them more, you might also be interested in learning more about what they like to talk about before deciding what conversations to bring up.
- An extrovert tends to be seen as talkative and sociable while an introvert is identified as shy, quiet, and reserved. Extroverts tend to seek out other people while introverts are more comfortable spending time on their own.
- It is completely normal to be a mixtrovert
- we just tend to define things according to a binary mindset.
- Agreeableness: your tendency to relate to other people in a friendly way, people who are agreeable tend to cooperate more, are more forgiving, and assume that other people are honest and trustworthy.
- People who are "disagreeable" tend to be suspicious and assume that other people are unreliable or ready to take advantage of them.
- It is ok to question everything, balance is the key.
- Past experience tends to be a reason for caution
- Awareness can be an ultra valid reason too
- It is ok to not be agreeable if you feel that it is time to hold back on blind trust, follow your intuition and trust yourself and set the boundaries that you need in the situation, nobody can tell you how to feel about a situation.
- Conscientiousness: how responsible and self-disciplined we are, how we think through decisions, think of consequences, follow through on projects.
- Stability: Ability to cope with change, people who are emotionally stable tend to be relaxed, secure, and calm, even during difficult situations. On the other end of the scale are people who are fearful, worried, and angry. They tend to focus on the negative and expect the worst in most situations. Balance is key here too, it is ok to consider the worst and safety plan/ think of how the worst can be prevented or what you would do in case of an emergency.
- Prepare for the worst and hope for the best, be in the present moment.
- Openness to experiences: being curious, imaginative, and creative, open minded people are likely to have a wide range of interests and may be less predictable, more independent, and be less likely to do what everyone else is doing.
- Environment and how it affects us:
- Friends: affect our behaviors through their conversations and activities
- We tend to want to validate our friends, to tell them that what they are doing is the right thing... hang out with friends that you can honestly validate.
- Friends influence our sense of agency, if they respect our boundaries then we will feel empowered to set healthy boundaries and expect others to listen. If our friends disregard your boundaries, we might normalize lack of respect for our boundaries.
- Boundaries can include things like giving out your phone number, getting in your space, sharing your personal information or experiences with others to make fun of you, tricking you in any way, not caring about how you feel if your are going through a difficult time, anything that makes it hard for you to see them as supportive friends.
- Friends can affect what we consider acceptable humor, topics of conversation, how we respond when someone else is struggling, so your culture of empathy.
- Family: Through family we learn about attitudes, feelings and ways to behave
- we are constantly reevaluating what we learned as children.
- Culture: Personality traits that are valued in one culture might not be as valued in another culture. Some cultures encourage people to be independent while some encourage people to fit in or be part of a community.
- We are constantly creating culture, it is a fluid and abstract concept
personality development
- Develop trust: An infant depends on others for food, clean diaper, and affection. If these needs are met, the child learns to trust other people. If these needs are not met, the child learns to mistrust and withdraw.
- So trust can be influenced before we even learn to speak.
- We can reconnect to trust by experiencing reasons to trust
- Learning to be independent: We learn to do things on our own, it can be considered part of personality, but intentional practice matters.
- If we master our goals we might feel a healthy sense of power and control within our reality.
- If we fail and have support, we can try again and thrive, if we fail and are ridiculed we might develop self-doubt, insecurity or shame.
- We can overcome insecurity and shame... creating a culture of support can prevent the emotional injury.
- Setting new goals and learning new skills can help us overcome self-doubt and regain a balanced sense of power and control.
- Mentioning "sense of power and control" is important because sometimes people will hurt others to mask insecurities. They will seek a sense of power and control over others instead of seeking a sense of power and control within their own stability and sense of security.
- Setting a goal can lead to regaining balance, the goal can be to accept yourself as you are.
ways to learn more about who you are
- Taking initiative: We plan our own activities and set our own goals based on our personal interests. As we develop a sense of right and wrong, we might take initiative to speak up against oppression and inequity.
- We think of new clubs, bands, web sites, dreams.
- Our level of initiative is part of personality
- Developing skills: As we grow, we learn how to take care of ourselves and others, how to have our needs met, study skills, learning skills, social skills, our skills help us feel competent, we know that we are closer to reaching our goals because we worked on gaining the skills that we will use to get there.
- Search for identity: Sense of self and what motivates us to keep on going. Your frame of mind or topics of conversation, what you like to do with your free time, what we are working on for ourselves and for others.
- Establishing intimacy: We establish close bonds with others and know that it won’t always go the way we expected but find ways to honor our boundaries and not give up on the possibility of building a large network of healthy relationships.
- If we support others and expect the same in return we build healthy rapport, and a culture of showing up and following through.
- Intimacy is any sharing of deep thoughts, experiences, a level of trust
- Create and nurture: Help your friends and family-thrive, tell them how they can help you thrive. Nurture vulnerable populations such as children and the elderly. Stay up to date with the agencies that serve them, monitor progress and funding sources for public health programs. Advocate for policies that protect them such as rigorous background checks for anyone that works with them. Build community events around raising awareness to hold space for artists and musicians.
- Look back with acceptance: Celebrate your success and work on new skills every step of the way. Take risks that you feel comfortable taking and consider the negative possibilities of the risk to see what you can do to avoid them or feel more prepared to face them. Look up articles and web sites that share tips and tricks. All we can do is try our best and if things don’t go well, it is not our fault. Older people tend to regret what they did not do more than what they did do. Failure is natural and part of the process of growing.
Setting goals
To create goals that are clear and reachable, create SMART goals:
- Specific (simple, sensible, significant).
- Measurable (meaningful, motivating).
- Achievable (agreed, attainable).
- Relevant (reasonable, realistic and resourced, results-based).
- Time bound (time-based, time limited, time/cost limited, timely, time-sensitive).
THOUGHTS to consider
The more we respect other people, the more we realize that people can be respectful, we are more likely to believe that other can be respectful because if we can do it, so can they
If someone is not respecting you, you can stop engaging, you are free to stop talking to them, we can't change anyone. You can let them know how they are bugging you but if they shame you or deny your experience then there is nothing you can do about that.
Retaliation often leads to escalation.
We tend to surround ourselves with people that are like us and share our sense of humor, this is the reason some people believe think stuff like "all people are racist" or "all men are sexist", oppression is normalized though "sense of humor" to mask the intent to oppress. A lot of truth is said in jest as people reveal their innermost values.
A great way to stop saying oppressive things is to stop thinking in an oppressive way.
If we say something oppressive, it is not a "slip-up", it is an expression of our values, we can correct ourselves by remembering where we learned to think this way and unpack our own logic. Reflect on why you said what you said and apologize to anyone that was hurt. Sometimes we have to unlearn may things to move forward.
Oppressive means: sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic, xenophobic, classist... any form of hate or negativity that aims to put some groups of people over others.
All oppression is learned.
It is usually a fear of lack of control over a situation, or fear of lack of resources. For example racism can come from wanting to put people down so they don't feel that they deserve to share space with you. Racism tends to discourage people from applying to jobs; they might feel that they won't fit in, or will constantly have to cope with racism and be stressed out on a daily basis.
A fear of lack of job opportunity can motivate a community to use racism to push people away; it is direct oppression, and it hurts entire communities.
This can rob us of the opportunity to learn from each other and even create more jobs.
Our values affect our personality.
If someone is not respecting you, you can stop engaging, you are free to stop talking to them, we can't change anyone. You can let them know how they are bugging you but if they shame you or deny your experience then there is nothing you can do about that.
Retaliation often leads to escalation.
We tend to surround ourselves with people that are like us and share our sense of humor, this is the reason some people believe think stuff like "all people are racist" or "all men are sexist", oppression is normalized though "sense of humor" to mask the intent to oppress. A lot of truth is said in jest as people reveal their innermost values.
A great way to stop saying oppressive things is to stop thinking in an oppressive way.
If we say something oppressive, it is not a "slip-up", it is an expression of our values, we can correct ourselves by remembering where we learned to think this way and unpack our own logic. Reflect on why you said what you said and apologize to anyone that was hurt. Sometimes we have to unlearn may things to move forward.
Oppressive means: sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic, xenophobic, classist... any form of hate or negativity that aims to put some groups of people over others.
All oppression is learned.
It is usually a fear of lack of control over a situation, or fear of lack of resources. For example racism can come from wanting to put people down so they don't feel that they deserve to share space with you. Racism tends to discourage people from applying to jobs; they might feel that they won't fit in, or will constantly have to cope with racism and be stressed out on a daily basis.
A fear of lack of job opportunity can motivate a community to use racism to push people away; it is direct oppression, and it hurts entire communities.
This can rob us of the opportunity to learn from each other and even create more jobs.
Our values affect our personality.
CHAPTER 1: WHAT IS HEALTH?
Book: Health, Prenctice Hall
Review the concepts found in your book:
- Health: overall well being of you body, mind, and relationships with other people
- Life expectancy: the number of years a person can expect to live
- Quality of life: the degree of overall satisfaction that a person gets from life
- Goals: a result that a person aims for and works hard to reach
- Physical health: how well your body functions, exercise
- Mental health: the state of being comfortable with yourself, with others, and with your surroundings
- Emotional health: how you react to events in your life, your mind is alert, you can learn from your mistakes, and recognize your achievements
- Social health: how well you get along with others, have loving relationships, respect the rights of others, give and accept help
- Wellness: ideal level of health
- Risk factors: any action or condition that increases the likelihood of injury, disease, or other negative outcome
- Habits and behavior: habits and behaviors are repeated so often that they become almost automatic
- Advocacy: using communication to influence and support others in making positive decisions
- Influences: anything that can affect your decisions, habits and behaviors
- Advertising: any effort to sell you products or services
oh yea, nutrition, that whole thing about eating well
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