Why Observe and Be Kind?
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You’ve called your podcast Observe and be kind… Can you tell us why?
I’ve called my podcast observe and be kind after trying to find a way to fit the word Trauma into the name but any we tried were taken, which I was actually happy about. So I had a think about what it is I do and it came to me… what do I say all the time, I say my job is observing and being kind.
Since I was a kid I’ve been interested in finding out what’s really going on. I was famous for it even. I’ve watched and listened, not just to what was being said but how it was being said. I looked for patterns. As a kid that was to keep me out of trouble to be fair. My startle response was driving the bus.
Now as a therapist and indeed as a parent I am listening with all my senses to see what’s really being said and I ask questions now to find the patterns.
Being kind is primarily about creating safety. After that it’s many things yet I put it into two categories. What I call Byron Bay or Santa Fe kindness…you know that gentle, always talking to your inner child, calm, relaxed, endless patience, always being there total listening… and then there’s the Dublin kindness which, fair fucks is a firm telling off.
What are you looking for when you are observing?
Great question to ask, what am I looking for when I’m observing. Let me explain a completed trauma cycle. This is what makes sense to me and it’s what I explain to my clients what the process is we are going to go through and what they are going through to be fair day to day…
So first of all we are starting off with one, socially engaged. Then there’s two, fight and flight charged, ready to move or moving. And then into three, freeze, four, fight and flight discharged, which happens in therapy, in my case. And to complete the cycle we return to socially engaged. I want to observe where the person operates within this cycle.
Most of the time when people come to me they are socially engaged. They are able to tell me what’s going on. Tell me where they are. May have a little bit of rabbit in the headlights. They don't know me. They may be new to the building, the town but they are able to talk to me, they’re with me. Sometimes people are agitated, showing me the signs of being in fight and flight. Others are very quiet. I have to coax them, draw their story out of them. These people appear to be frozen to me. Then there are those who are moving involuntarily, legs twitching, they are crying a lot… seems to me their bodies are discharging already. They are a little bit out of control.
So let me explain more about this cycle. When we are choosing to be still we are socially engaged. So choosing to be still we are socially engaged. Choosing to be still is the operative words there to take in. Even if alone we are present and engaged with our environment, we are happy with where we are. We are acting from what’s called the parasympathetic nervous system.
Then, let’s say there’s a loud noise, a very loud noise, we would automatically go into fight and flight. No choice in the matter. It’s on. We are now acting from our sympathetic nervous system. And remember it’s automatic. Any time you are thinking, oh why did I do that, our nervous system takes over. It’s how we have evolved. We don’t get to choose. Out bodies are definitely moving internally and ideally externally.
Yet if the threat is too big for us to fight or flee our nervous system deems it safer for us to freeze, to collapse, that’s number three. This too is happening automatically. Please remember that. We can have a tendency to give ourselves a hard time about this process, but if it’s happening involuntarily, we don’t have a choice. That collapse can be anything from just not being about to talk, knowing that you are not able to talk, right the way through to fainting, left the building, yer gone. We are back in the parasympathetic nervous system, only this time we did not choose to be still our nervous system decided for us.
So the parasympathetic system is a place where we live in stillness out of choice or not. Now… if we have learned to discharge the fight and flight energy we didn’t use, then we will let it out, we will move—cry, wail, shake, sigh etc—until the system calms and returns to socially engaged. Usually this does not happen automatically unless we have been educated on how to do it or just naturally allowed to since we were children. More often we just hold on to it and that’s why we need therapy.
What does this all mean day to day before you find therapy?
For those who do not know how to discharge they are often caught in a loop. Worse case scenario they are never socially engaged. Which is very sad. When all is well for them the frozen state may soften a little and the fright and flight energy will bubble up, they will behave inappropriately sometimes, which will scare them and sometimes others, causing them to return to freeze. This loop can often be referred to as post traumatic stress disorder or PTSD. I’m not a fan of the term for two reasons. One, it seems unfair to call it a disorder when the nervous system is only doing what it knows how to do until given more skills, and two, the word post indicates that the event is in the past yet for the person suffering it feels like it’s still happening.
Mostly I see people who are living in fight and flight as they often describe it and find they can’t control their behaviour and it is distressing them and those around them. Or people who tell me they are fine and then suddenly not. Often they don’t notice till later. This tell me they are frozen or fine, socially engaged and then, often when it’s not appreciate they behave in a way they regret. Usually not doing what they want. Usually going along and wish they could say no but mostly say yes.
So I’m listening to find out… simply put are they a “fight and flighter” or a “freezer”? They we go from there.
So once you know the diagnosis which kind do you choose?
Kindness begins the moment I first talk to or meet the person. That can be on the phone or in person. My job is to provide the opposite circumstances of when the trauma happened. But I also need to meet the person where they are. So if a client is very quiet, I will be quiet. If they are loud, I am loud. If their energy is high, mine needs to be high too.
Which type of kindness will depend on what’s needed. Are there other ways to describe observing and being kind, I’ve asked myself. Other ways we could look at observing and being kind are listening versus talking, empathy versus compassion, non-movement versus movement.
So if observing is listening, empathy and been still then being kind is talking, being compassionate and moving. This is all to make sense of what we are talking about specifically here. Compassion is often I think, certainly I used to think so, seen as something that’s very gentle. Yet I know that compassion can look very brutal too. It’s all about the intention. It’s all about love.
Going back now to what type of kindness is needed well that depends on what type of love is needed. Is it gentle love or is it tough love. Sometimes I have to tell the truth that’s hard for the person to hear. Last year I had a client who had been diagnosed with terminal cancer. They were in total denial and that made for an unsafe situation. My job was to open this persons eyes so they could choose how they spend their final weeks or months, whateever they had. This was requested by their family.
To begin with I just listened to her tell me about her life. She had had little choice most of her life and this is what upset her. Now she had no one to please, she had choice, so she couldn’t accept she was going to die. It seemed unfair. Lots of gentle compassion needed.
But the weeks were going by and gentleness was no longer working. So I became very firm. My goodness I found myself telling her what was going to happen. What potential awfulness lay ahead. She fought me. Why won’t she. She was terrified. Oh she cried and cried as she came to realise yet she was so grateful. So she decided what she wanted and thank goodness she went quietly in her sleep a few weeks later. Timing ! Her family too were very grateful because those last weeks were peaceful.
What’s the point of all this observing and be kind though?
The point of all this observing and being kind or empathy and compassion is to inform and educate the person that their stress and or their trauma is not a life sentence. It is possible to be happy, possible to be happier. To be free of the past. To be freer in the present. To control and have a choice about how they behave.
The road we take is negotiated together. Trauma takes away your choice and I want to give that back to you. It’s all about skills. Trauma is caused by neglect and parenting your parents. I will talk more about this in the future. But if just for a moment if we briefly look at neglect. Neglect means we don’t know what to do. So me job is mostly to educate, to teach the person the skills of how to observe and be kind.
What would be something you could tell us that would make us feel less alone in all this?
I’ve thought a lot about what it means to be mentally well or unwell. What makes sense to me is this: however long it takes for us to adjust to change shows where we are at mentally. There are many factors at play of course. If our basic needs have not been met. That is how well we’ve eaten, slept, housed, all that stuff. If we are in pain or unwell. If we are in healthy relationship or not, so many factors… What we were born with even.
My point is if we can observe our adjustment to change and be kind to where we are at and no more, it is a wonderful place to start.
Thank you for listening today.
I’ve called my podcast observe and be kind after trying to find a way to fit the word Trauma into the name but any we tried were taken, which I was actually happy about. So I had a think about what it is I do and it came to me… what do I say all the time, I say my job is observing and being kind.
Since I was a kid I’ve been interested in finding out what’s really going on. I was famous for it even. I’ve watched and listened, not just to what was being said but how it was being said. I looked for patterns. As a kid that was to keep me out of trouble to be fair. My startle response was driving the bus.
Now as a therapist and indeed as a parent I am listening with all my senses to see what’s really being said and I ask questions now to find the patterns.
Being kind is primarily about creating safety. After that it’s many things yet I put it into two categories. What I call Byron Bay or Santa Fe kindness…you know that gentle, always talking to your inner child, calm, relaxed, endless patience, always being there total listening… and then there’s the Dublin kindness which, fair fucks is a firm telling off.
What are you looking for when you are observing?
Great question to ask, what am I looking for when I’m observing. Let me explain a completed trauma cycle. This is what makes sense to me and it’s what I explain to my clients what the process is we are going to go through and what they are going through to be fair day to day…
So first of all we are starting off with one, socially engaged. Then there’s two, fight and flight charged, ready to move or moving. And then into three, freeze, four, fight and flight discharged, which happens in therapy, in my case. And to complete the cycle we return to socially engaged. I want to observe where the person operates within this cycle.
Most of the time when people come to me they are socially engaged. They are able to tell me what’s going on. Tell me where they are. May have a little bit of rabbit in the headlights. They don't know me. They may be new to the building, the town but they are able to talk to me, they’re with me. Sometimes people are agitated, showing me the signs of being in fight and flight. Others are very quiet. I have to coax them, draw their story out of them. These people appear to be frozen to me. Then there are those who are moving involuntarily, legs twitching, they are crying a lot… seems to me their bodies are discharging already. They are a little bit out of control.
So let me explain more about this cycle. When we are choosing to be still we are socially engaged. So choosing to be still we are socially engaged. Choosing to be still is the operative words there to take in. Even if alone we are present and engaged with our environment, we are happy with where we are. We are acting from what’s called the parasympathetic nervous system.
Then, let’s say there’s a loud noise, a very loud noise, we would automatically go into fight and flight. No choice in the matter. It’s on. We are now acting from our sympathetic nervous system. And remember it’s automatic. Any time you are thinking, oh why did I do that, our nervous system takes over. It’s how we have evolved. We don’t get to choose. Out bodies are definitely moving internally and ideally externally.
Yet if the threat is too big for us to fight or flee our nervous system deems it safer for us to freeze, to collapse, that’s number three. This too is happening automatically. Please remember that. We can have a tendency to give ourselves a hard time about this process, but if it’s happening involuntarily, we don’t have a choice. That collapse can be anything from just not being about to talk, knowing that you are not able to talk, right the way through to fainting, left the building, yer gone. We are back in the parasympathetic nervous system, only this time we did not choose to be still our nervous system decided for us.
So the parasympathetic system is a place where we live in stillness out of choice or not. Now… if we have learned to discharge the fight and flight energy we didn’t use, then we will let it out, we will move—cry, wail, shake, sigh etc—until the system calms and returns to socially engaged. Usually this does not happen automatically unless we have been educated on how to do it or just naturally allowed to since we were children. More often we just hold on to it and that’s why we need therapy.
What does this all mean day to day before you find therapy?
For those who do not know how to discharge they are often caught in a loop. Worse case scenario they are never socially engaged. Which is very sad. When all is well for them the frozen state may soften a little and the fright and flight energy will bubble up, they will behave inappropriately sometimes, which will scare them and sometimes others, causing them to return to freeze. This loop can often be referred to as post traumatic stress disorder or PTSD. I’m not a fan of the term for two reasons. One, it seems unfair to call it a disorder when the nervous system is only doing what it knows how to do until given more skills, and two, the word post indicates that the event is in the past yet for the person suffering it feels like it’s still happening.
Mostly I see people who are living in fight and flight as they often describe it and find they can’t control their behaviour and it is distressing them and those around them. Or people who tell me they are fine and then suddenly not. Often they don’t notice till later. This tell me they are frozen or fine, socially engaged and then, often when it’s not appreciate they behave in a way they regret. Usually not doing what they want. Usually going along and wish they could say no but mostly say yes.
So I’m listening to find out… simply put are they a “fight and flighter” or a “freezer”? They we go from there.
So once you know the diagnosis which kind do you choose?
Kindness begins the moment I first talk to or meet the person. That can be on the phone or in person. My job is to provide the opposite circumstances of when the trauma happened. But I also need to meet the person where they are. So if a client is very quiet, I will be quiet. If they are loud, I am loud. If their energy is high, mine needs to be high too.
Which type of kindness will depend on what’s needed. Are there other ways to describe observing and being kind, I’ve asked myself. Other ways we could look at observing and being kind are listening versus talking, empathy versus compassion, non-movement versus movement.
So if observing is listening, empathy and been still then being kind is talking, being compassionate and moving. This is all to make sense of what we are talking about specifically here. Compassion is often I think, certainly I used to think so, seen as something that’s very gentle. Yet I know that compassion can look very brutal too. It’s all about the intention. It’s all about love.
Going back now to what type of kindness is needed well that depends on what type of love is needed. Is it gentle love or is it tough love. Sometimes I have to tell the truth that’s hard for the person to hear. Last year I had a client who had been diagnosed with terminal cancer. They were in total denial and that made for an unsafe situation. My job was to open this persons eyes so they could choose how they spend their final weeks or months, whateever they had. This was requested by their family.
To begin with I just listened to her tell me about her life. She had had little choice most of her life and this is what upset her. Now she had no one to please, she had choice, so she couldn’t accept she was going to die. It seemed unfair. Lots of gentle compassion needed.
But the weeks were going by and gentleness was no longer working. So I became very firm. My goodness I found myself telling her what was going to happen. What potential awfulness lay ahead. She fought me. Why won’t she. She was terrified. Oh she cried and cried as she came to realise yet she was so grateful. So she decided what she wanted and thank goodness she went quietly in her sleep a few weeks later. Timing ! Her family too were very grateful because those last weeks were peaceful.
What’s the point of all this observing and be kind though?
The point of all this observing and being kind or empathy and compassion is to inform and educate the person that their stress and or their trauma is not a life sentence. It is possible to be happy, possible to be happier. To be free of the past. To be freer in the present. To control and have a choice about how they behave.
The road we take is negotiated together. Trauma takes away your choice and I want to give that back to you. It’s all about skills. Trauma is caused by neglect and parenting your parents. I will talk more about this in the future. But if just for a moment if we briefly look at neglect. Neglect means we don’t know what to do. So me job is mostly to educate, to teach the person the skills of how to observe and be kind.
What would be something you could tell us that would make us feel less alone in all this?
I’ve thought a lot about what it means to be mentally well or unwell. What makes sense to me is this: however long it takes for us to adjust to change shows where we are at mentally. There are many factors at play of course. If our basic needs have not been met. That is how well we’ve eaten, slept, housed, all that stuff. If we are in pain or unwell. If we are in healthy relationship or not, so many factors… What we were born with even.
My point is if we can observe our adjustment to change and be kind to where we are at and no more, it is a wonderful place to start.
Thank you for listening today.