PhD in Being Me

Tag: overwhelm

  • A pause

    A tree with orange leaves on the ground all around it, with mist in the background
    A quiet place among the leaves and mist

    The older I have gotten (I am 44), the more I am giving myself permission to pause.  A pause can mean many things, including:

    • Taking a breath before I respond to a person or a situation
    • Deciding that I will get back to a person instead of answering them right away
    • Prioritizing taking care of myself, even if just for a short while, before working through the items on my to do list.

    Am I an expert at pausing?  Sometimes, and sometimes I rush and feel so much pressure that a pause is the last thing I think about. 

    Learning about me from my experiences is the point of working towards a PhD in Being Me.  I am at the school of me, learning every day about how best to take care of myself and honour myself as I live my life.  And to do this with as much kindness, grace, care and love I can possibly give myself, including giving myself a big or little pause when I need it.

    I have had a very narrow window of tolerance for the last several months as I was very stressed out by my life’s circumstances.  I have included a pdf for those new to the window of tolerance concept or how trauma can influence your window of tolerance (I hope it works!)

    Window of ToleranceDownload

    As I take better care of myself, my window of tolerance is increasing.  With that increase, it is getting easier to notice when a pause would benefit me.

    For example, I was annoyed by my dog’s behavior the other day, and I realized that I had other choices than getting really angry or crying.  Just that realization alone was the pause I needed to access more choices within me.  It was like I saw the overwhelmed and tired parts of myself and honoured them with that pause that allowed me to choose how to respond better. 

    Being off work has allowed me to see how much I was just holding on and coping every day, instead of living and thriving.  I know many of us can relate to those words.  If you can, I send you many big hugs, it sure is tough.  No matter where you are in your life, whether you are thriving or just holding on, may there be many more golden pauses available to you, and lots of love, kindness and peace too. 

    With lots of care 💕, Bradlee

    © Bradlee Zrudlo 2024. All Rights Reserved

  • Shattered Innocence

    A dead flower with snow in the background.
    Photo by Eva Bronzini on Pexels.com

    Sometimes life is just so disappointing, so much so that one’s heart breaks and it feels like all the good inside has died. This poem is about those types of day. As I wrote it, it felt very sad and angry. As I kept writing, I felt like my shattered innocence was giving me a different way to view those disappointments and shattering. Can you see the shift or feel in the poem too? Xoxoxo

    Thanks for reading!

    Shattered Innocence – a poem

    I greeted today with an open heart and much excitement.

    I try to approach every day like that, to be the one who brings love to the world, to the little moments, to every moment.

    It gets impossible though when life seems to want to crush that from within me.

    When it shares the most horrendous secrets of humanity with me and my innocence shatters and expires before I can even react to protect it.

    Humanity seems to have this festering abscess right on it’s heart and it’s wanting to burst open and ooze it’s putrescence over everything.

    I want to rage and scream and stop all of the suffering. I want to slap people and tell them to wake up, to stop, to appreciate life, to appreciate the good in it all. To see how much trauma, suffering and awfulness there is and to choose love. To stop spewing vile hatred and to start the healing.

    AAAARGHHHHH.

    Purest, delicate beauty.

    Tender innocence.

    Soft, gentle and caring heart.

    So perfect, so beautiful and so vulnerable to this world’s vile acts of hatred and suffering.

    Oh my tender, tender innocence.

    I wish I could protect you better, and wrap you up in a soft blanket, like I would a precious newborn, to keep you safe from all the suffering in this world.

    Now that we’ve reconnected, I don’t want to lose you all over again to the darkness and horrendous pain that is spewing out of humanity’s abscess of pain and torture and hatred.

    I see it pulsating and getting thinner just as it explodes sending shards of pain, torture and hatred everywhere.

    I want to shelter you, protect you and stop this hurting you feel.

    Is there anything I can do for you?

    Is there any way I can support you better when you are exposed to such negativity, suffering and unconscionable things?

    Oh, you want to be tucked into my heart for bedtime?

    You’d like me to read you a nice story and remind you of the good in the world?

    Okay, precious one, let’s do that. You are so beautiful, resilient and courageous.

    Please continue to teach me how to nurture you and look after you when you shatter.

    I’m so grateful to learn that the shattering isn’t permanent.

    Thank you for teaching me dearest innocence.

    Thank you.

    An early spring morning sunset
    After writing this, I felt renewed and ready for the day. Just like this beautiful sun rising up in the morning.

  • Walking Together

    Photo of a pumpkin carved into a heart, with a candle inside.
    My first heart pumpkin, it felt so right to put some love out on Halloween!

    Walking Together – a poem

    Hello my darling one,

    I feel that my whole energy field is jangled and that there is a sensitivity on my skin because my nervous system is all out of whack.

    How can I best help you dearest one? 

    You are so important to me, more than important than anything.

    You matter to me like the Earth needs the sun and rain.

    You matter to me like my inhalations and exhalations.

    There is no me without you and I’m wondering how you are doing?

    This is a really big change, a huge one.  It’s one that used to shatter me into many pieces and it feels like that is happening again.

    Oh, ya?  Is that right? The shattering isn’t necessarily a bad thing?  How is this shattering helping me do you think?

    It’s giving me a chance to align myself differently with the world?  To position myself from a place of confidence and authority, those positions that I have learned about and explored over the past several years?

    Hmmm, that makes sense.  What do you think I need to do to nurture myself during this shattering?

    Breathe in confidence and breathe out doubt.  Breathe in all the beauty that I am and smile for all that I thought I was that is now in millions of pieces on the ground.

    Go outside, lay on the snow and smile and breathe deeply.

    Here I am, I am here.  As beautiful and vulnerable and cute as ever, but with a greater connection to myself and what matters to me.

    Here I am, I am here, regardless of whether our foster dog is anxious, abused and recovering or not.  

    Here I am, I am here, precious, sensitive and in need of care.

    Here I am, breaking the cycles of abuse within me and around me by daring to turn within to nurture myself and be with myself while I am processing, discovering, thriving and struggling. 

    Here I am.

    I am here.

    May I always be here for myself with every breath I take. 

    Note from me about this poem:

    I wrote this poem in December 2022 shortly after we welcomed a new dog into our family. He was a stray dog and he had a lot of anxiety and trauma. I was completely overwhelmed by his needs at first and I wrote this poem to help me process what I was feeling. Lately, life has been giving me opportunities to approach circumstances differently than I used to. I felt very much like this was one of those times, but I wasn’t sure how to approach anything differently. Writing this helped me connect to that fear and overwhelm and gave my maturity a chance to rise up from the scattered pieces of myself to guide me. I love reading this again, it helps me. May we all be blessed with inspiration about how we can best help, guide, and support ourselves! Big hugs!! xoxoxo Bradlee

    A blue sky with the sun hidden by misty clouds low in the sky.
    This photo reminds me of my wisdom and maturity coming up from within me, just like the sun rising above those beautiful clouds. This photo is from a gorgeous morning in Kemptville.

    © Bradlee Zrudlo 2022. All Rights Reserved.