Do you ACTUALLY know how to be happy?

Alright....I hope this title caught your attention! I definitely meant it to.

I have a bold and daring truth I want to share with you in this post. Now before I get to it, I want to add in my disclaimer, because well that's always important and ethical and well, a single post can't TRULY capture all of the information and wisdom and it for sure can't be used as a blanket statement for all people.

Disclaimer - there are legitimate medical and psychiatric diagnosis' to be considered. And there are definite traumas and atrocities in this world that painfully rob us of our relationship to happiness. Happiness is not a constant state. And happiness is extremely subjective.

Ok! Disclaimer out of the way. Now for the general group of us that are not immediately dealing with the above disclaimer - let's take a look at happiness.

I have been noticing a very interesting trend in counselling adult individuals. A session will be progressing as they always do, and there may be small moments of relief, small moments of joy or excitement, or small moments of being proud of oneself.

AND THEN THIS HAPPENS!

Enter the "anvil moment". Out of "no where" there is this imaginary anvil that comes crashing into the session - I can often even see people contract and tense in their body. Simultaneously as this metaphorical anvil is dropping my client is sharing some type of statement that has a general underlying theme - a self criticism, a prophetic "waiting for the next bad thing to come", or a general dismissal of their accomplishment.

Does this feel hard to believe? If it doesn't that is wonderful! What an amazing relationship to yourself and to fully embracing the emotion of happiness and its sensations.

But, if you are like many or even most of us (even myself included here! I am human too!) we are oddly averse to expansive and enlivening emotions like happiness.

Let me give you a simple anvil moment - you get your first "big" job and you start to really enjoy your accomplishment (you smile, your chest starts to feel alive and your gut may start to feel giddy). Immediately there is this thought that jumps into your mind - "I am the youngest employee in there, they won't take me seriously". ANVIL. The smile fades, the excitement and warmth immediately disappears.

WHY ON EARTH WOULD THIS EVEN MAKE SENSE!?!

Well, let me share a little "science" with you on why in the world this is even a thing.

Dr. Paul Maclean was an American physician and neuroscientist who is credited for the evolutionary triune brain theory. This work continues to be used today and has continued to evolve in understanding and application.

In a nutshell - we can look at the brain as three evolutionary parts, to make is as easy to understand as possible I have made this for you!

(*And! Because I genuinely care about your personal development, the viewing link is below the image incase you want an actual copy).

VIEWING LINK HERE

Ok - so now that you have a general understanding of the three parts, let's talk about the stress response. You have maybe heard of it, but if you haven't - simply put our brain has a system that ONLY cares about our core vitals and SURVIVAL. When any threat or potential or even perceived threat is identified, our stress response kicks in. And for good reason! Remember, this is a basic part of your brain and it cares so much about keeping you alive it will kick into high gear with the stress response.

The stress response has three actions:

FIGHT.

FLIGHT.

FREEZE.

These actions are exactly what the words mean and can present in a variety of ways for each of our unique bodies.

(*You may have also heard of a fawn 'stress response', and yes this is a thing. Intellectuals have some deeper descriptions of the fawn response and if it is a true stress response from the sympathetic nervous system, but that is a topic for a different discussion. For the purpose of this post, I will stick with these three actions).

I will try to be as clear and concise as possible here, and get to the point of why it can sometimes (often) be hard for us to really connect with and relish in happiness.

1) We all have a brain that has a stress response, this isn't going anywhere.

2) We will all have lived experiences that trigger our stress response. For a variety or reasons.

3) We are sadly not well educated and supported in learning this about ourselves and our bodies until AFTER it becomes a necessity.

4) We live in a fast paced society and a "hustle & grind culture" that more often than not doesn't support mental health and the benefits of slowing down, having breaks and attuning to our physical bodies. This is the perfect environment to MAINTAIN an activated stress response.

5) There are two branches to our autonomic nervous system - the sympathetic branch (STRESS RESPONSE) and the parasympathetic branch (REST & DIGEST). A maintained stress response means our nervous system is more or less stuck, functioning from only HALF of its capability. Which translates into you only experiencing a certain combination of sensations in your body related to the stress response.

6) Our stress response gets conditioned to go from a SURVIVAL mechanism, into a daily habit of functioning. It starts to feel dare I say "normal".

7) When we start to feel relaxed or calm or peaceful or when we start to connect with genuine happiness (an expansive and enlightening emotion), it feels in a weird way uncomfortable/foreign/new or even threatening to our CONDITIONED body and nervous system that is 'stuck' in the stress response.

8) In that moment we connect to happiness (feeling less tension in the body, feeling warmth in our chest, a smile to our face for example) it challenges the CONDITIONED experiences we are accustomed to feeling with the everyday stress response (tightness, tension, clamped jaw, tight shoulders etc...).

9) What is the anvil moment? It is the resistance of our nervous system to switch gears from the sympathetic branch into the parasympathetic branch. I very commonly see the anvil moment done through the thoughts of our mind; after all this is the origin of our stress response and arguably where out "awareness" exists.

I hope I was able to explain this through written word, I do admit it is easier to voice in person but I am showing up and giving it my best shot here for you!

The next time you are starting to notice yourself feeling happiness (or any emotional experience that is expansive) simply reflect on how long you are able to genuinely connect with this emotional experience before your mind chimes in with some kind of anvil moment - nonsense that is usually negative and CONTRACTING.

Contracting means your body tenses up again, tightness returns, breathing may become shallow or rigid. The stress response uses contraction when activated for survival - muscles are readied for action.

BUT WHEN WE GET CONDITIONED TO FUNCTION FROM A STRESS RESPONSE STATE, CONTRACTION BECOMES THE NORMAL EXPERIENCE OF OURSELF IN OUR BODY.

Read it again.

So? Do you actually know how to be happy? Now, I am going to venture a guess that yes, you likely do. If we really want to split hairs here, for how long can you genuinely connect with an emotional experience that is EXPANSIVE (the opposite of contracting).

Now at this point of the post you might be wondering - 'ok, so how do I change this?'

Get COMPASSIONATELY CURIOUS with yourself. Starting to tune in to your body and see if you can notice the difference between contraction and expansion in your body. And when you connect with something that feels expansive, be curious for how long you can 'stay' in that moment, before some kind of anvil moment hits. Next step? Be a gentle observer of that anvil moment - what was the theme or general nature of that anvil moment thought?

The more you can do this simple practice, the more you can really learn about yourself in your body, what contracts or expands you, and the possible conditioned habits you may have built up in life from an activated stress response.

I have something EXTRA I would love to share with you! The link below is a visual infographic if you will, all about your nervous system.

NERVOUS SYSTEM VISUAL

I want to thank you so much for taking the time to connect here with me, and letting me share information with you that I am so deeply passionate about! In fact, being able to share information and helpful tips with you is how I can connect with what EXPANDS my own experiences. For that I am deeply grateful.

If you really valued this post and the information I have shared, I would be thrilled for you to share it forward with someone else who would also like it!

And as usual;

Journey on...

Chrissy