APO's Blog
Weathering Winter
by Tony Onorato
on Feb-01-2012
Winter is a time of year that many people would like to avoid. It’s cold and dark. These realities force us to compensate in ways we don’t have to during the rest of the year. The cold weather means putting a lot of energy and resources toward staying warm. We wear heavier clothing, turn up the heat in our homes and have to warm the car up before we drive. Snow and ice require that we take time to shovel the driveway and result in the need for extra driving precautions. The lack of sunlight has a lot of us waking up in the dark and coming home from work in the dark.
All in all, many of us would rather go the way of the bear and hibernate until spring arrives. We imagine how nice it would be to curl up in a warm cozy place and stay out of the cold and sleep while it’s dark.
The only problem is that we don’t have that luxury. We still have to go about our daily activities and take care of our responsibilities. In a way, wishing that it was spring makes it worse. The more time we spend trying to escape the winter weather, the more power we give it over us. We end up dwelling on the things we like the least and making the winter seem longer than it is.
The best way to handle the effects of winter is to find a way to make them work for you rather than feel as if you have to fight them all the time. For example, one can look for the beauty in a snow covered landscape or the pure joy of a sled ride down a hill. In a world filled with incessant noise, revel in a few moments of the peaceful quiet that a snowy day brings. The cold can be used as an excuse to cuddle with a loved one. Driving conditions can provide an opportunity to slow down the pace of life a little bit. The dark gives us a chance to go to bed a little earlier than usual.
We can’t get caught up in allowing the weather associated with this time of year to negatively influence the way we view life. That is exactly what makes us feel out of control and adds an unnecessary stress to our lives. Winter should never control ones frame of mind, otherwise three months out of the year (or a quarter of our lives) will be something we would rather avoid.
Managing Stress
by Tony Onorato
on Nov-18-2010
The effects of long-term stress can be devastating. Its impact on the body is seen in the form of suppressing the immune system. Its impact on the mind is found in emotional problems such as worry, anxiety and depression.
In response to this discovery, volumes of books and tapes have been produced that give tips and advice on the issue. Everyone has a “Ten Ways to Reduce Stress” list. In this age of information, finding a practical and affordable way to manage stress can be confusing. It may actually add to the stress one already feels.
While most stress reduction lists focus on techniques, they forget to provide a foundation from which to build the skills. Without the foundation, the skills do not help as much as they could.
The best foundation for reducing stress is to identify what you can control and what you cannot. The major build-up of stress within people comes from trying to control things they cannot and not doing something about the things they can control.
How do you know what you can and cannot control? Take all the things that occur within you, such as your emotions, thoughts and actions and place them in the “I Can Control” category. Take everything else and place them in the “I Cannot Control” category.
The only things a person has any chance of controlling are those that come from within. Learn to focus your energy into the way you choose to think about a situation. Concentrate on directing your emotion in a way that is helpful to you. Work on spending your time doing what is most important to you.
When you start to notice a build-up of stress or pressure, work to pinpoint the source of the stress. Is it something related to you or a circumstance that is beyond your ability to control? If it is you, then you have some direct control over the outcome. If it is outside of you, then at best, you may have some impact on the outcome but no control over it.
Keep your mind focused on the areas you can impact. It will allow you to be in more control of you rather than feeling like situations control you. You will also notice that you are making progress instead feeling like you are spinning your wheels in quagmire.
The other stress reducing aspect of keeping your mind focused on what can control is that it enables you to let go of the things that are beyond your control. Your mind becomes so occupied with doing your part that the rest slips into the background.
It is amazing how making a small adjustment to where you put your mind’s energy can make stress much more manageable.
The Many Faces of Grief
by Tony Onorato
on Aug-18-2010
The risk of loving is the fear and consequences of loss. Committing one's life to spouse, child or profession risks the pain we know awaits in the future if these connections are severed or drastically altered.
Grieving is the process by which we come to terms with these losses. We slowly replace the pain and the fear of feeling that pain again with the courage to once more risk commitment or love. Trying to skip the grieving process will most likely lead to an inability to make future commitments, ultimately leaving us isolated and alone.
The most commonly recognized form of loss relates to the death of a loved one. We all understand the pain associated with death, yet there are other etiologies for losses we experience that may also elicit the need to grieve such as injury, illness, divorce, infidelity, substance abuse/addiction, civil or criminal charges, unemployment, disability, professional disciplinary actions and many others. Any of these can sever our connection to important elements of our lives.
People who experience serious illness or disabling injury often grieve the loss of the person they used to be. They view their subsequent situation and its limitations in comparison to the health they previously enjoyed. They may miss activities they once performed easily and well, yet now require intense effort and concentration if able to perform at all.
Divorce can foster a sense of loss in parents and their children. Each will lose significant periods of time once spent together as a family. Both may lose friends. Those divorced may lose mutual friends of the couple who have stronger ties to their former spouse. Children may lose friends through changing their place of residence. In large part the adjustment of divorce is related to grieving for lost or altered relationships.
Another form of grieving involves the loss of a dream. We are often faced with the death of dreams for children, careers, lifestyles and relationships. Real and perceived losses of children such as those related to substance abuse, infertility, spontaneous and induced abortions, stillbirths, and newborn through adult deaths often impact one's hopes and visions for the future. Yes, we can grieve the loss of something we never even had.
During the course of life we all inevitably and repeatedly lose people and things we love, valued parts of our lives with which we are strongly connected. These losses come in a variety of ways but hidden within their pain are opportunities for personal growth. Grieving may not be so much about letting connections go as it is about finding new ones, new ways to enjoy life and in the process become more than we were.
The Drive Home
by Tony Onorato
on Aug-01-2010
It's much easier to be the parent of an athlete who's just won the game on last second heroics. Everyone feels good and is all smiles. What a thrill it is to watch one's child succeed.
However, for every team that wins, there is a team that loses. It doesn't really matter if it was a great play on the opposing team's part or a mistake on your end.
There was some athlete who gave up the game winning hit or struck out with runners in scoring position. Somebody missed the tackle, fumbled the ball or dropped the pass. Someone's son or daughter gave up the winning goal or missed a scoring chance.
Dealing with the agony of defeat is one of the more difficult challenges of parenthood. Seeing one's child in emotional pain and anguish is distressing regardless of the child's age.
The awkward moments that constitute the drive home are the times when parents really earn their stripes. This is when the kids are their most vulnerable. What parents say and do at these times can have a tremendous impact on their child's psyche.
The first thing parents need to be aware of is their own level of emotional discomfort, which in many cases is transformed into some form of anger. It's a matter of keeping track of what one can control and how to direct it.
The tendency of most parents is to want to make their child feel better. They want the pain to go away, the child's pain and their own. The bizarre and sometimes frightening things we hear occurring at sporting events are often related to parents who say and do things to make themselves temporarily feel better even though it negatively impacts their kids.
One of the truisms in life is; pain is inevitable, suffering is optional. The mistake parents are prone to make is trying to remove the emotional pain. There is nothing wrong with experiencing pain. It's actually beneficial to acknowledge its existence as a normal part of life that they will conquer as they build the inner resources and self-confidence that comes with knowing they can and will survive it.
Some parents will skip right to analyzing the game. They want to take the pain away by solving the problems. The pitfall is that if the athlete tends to focus on mistakes and have negative self-talk based on some derivative of "I stink," this will make it worse. It's even an incredible challenge for kids who do not think in this manner because it feeds that negative mindset by focusing their attention on all the things they did poorly at the time when they feel the lowest.
The ride home becomes a mobile torture chamber in which athletes get to relive everything they did wrong. The longer the ride the more often they get to relive it.
Other parents will immediately attempt to cheer athletes up, make them smile or tell athletes that it's all right. The message is often interpreted that there is something wrong with feeling disappointed. Since pain is inevitable, that message increases suffering since the focus is on avoiding pain. Think of the anguish that is created by the dilemma of trying to avoid something that is unavoidable.
Occasionally, a parent will validate the feeling then turn around and psychologically bind the athlete by telling him or her to remember it well so that they will use it as a motivator to avoid feeling that way again.
Athletes start to think of life as all risk and little reward.
What can a parent say or do?
Validate the emotion. "It hurts, doesn't it?"
Make a connection. "It used to hurt me too. It still does."
Provide a little hope. "I learned that it doesn't always feel like it does now. It doesn't last forever. At some point you'll notice that it hurts a little less and that it continues to move in that direction."
Offer some help and space. "Let me know when or if you want some help. I'll be happy to work on it with you."
Let them know you love them and that they don't have to dwell on it. "Hey, I'm hungry. Do you want to get something to eat?"®2002
