Three Inner Experiential Exercises

Summary:  In this episode I discuss the crucial role of the right kinds of corrective and healing experiences in our lives.  I then offer you three inner experiential exercises to help you understand three questions: 1) In what ways do you not love yourself (with a special focus on inner critics); 2) your inner tension between connection and protection; and 3) your internal battles with rigidity and chaos.
Lead in:  
Experience.  
I have been wanting for a long time to offer you some experiential exercises 
In episodes 89, 90, and 92, I gave you a lot of conceptual information about polyvagal theory, about interpersonal neurobiology, some more about Internal family systems, but something has been missing
And what's been missing, in my opinion, is the experiential part of this for us.  
Julius Caesar "Experience is the teacher of all things"  De Bello Civilli
John Stuart Mill:  There are many truths of which the full meaning cannot be realized until personal experience has brought it home.  -- On liberty

Experience.  There is no substitute for experiential learning
 Otherwise it can stay all in the conceptual realm, all in your head, all in your mind.  Michael Smith:  The major problem is that we tend to live our life in our head, in our thoughts and stories, cut off from our actual experience.

What I want for you is much more than that.  I want you to be able to change for the better in the deepest ways.  And you can't think or study your way there

Not the same experiences over and over -- some people have that kind of life.  
Rather, a capacity for experience -- the ability to take in, process, and integrate new experiences as part of your human formation.  
George Bernard Shaw:  Men are wise in proportion, not to their experience, but to their capacity for experience.

What holds us back?
 Many would say fear.  Fear of the unknown.  Fear of putting ourselves out there.  Fear keeps us from new experiences and for the corrective effects of new experiences.  And I think that's true.  But I don't think fear is the primary obstacle.  There's some thing deeper than fear that holds us back.

 
What is it that really holds us back from new experiences?  What goes deeper than our fear?  [Drum roll]
Our Shame.  It is our shame that holds us back from new experiences and the healing that new experiences can bring to us.
The fear is a secondary reaction.  We wouldn't have the fear if we didn't have the shame, the gnawing sense of inadequacy or not being good enough.  Too much shame makes us fragile, way to concerned about protecting ourselves
And in the natural realm, it's shame that most often keeps us from taking in the love from God, from others, and from ourselves -- it's shame that generates our fear, the desire to protect our wounds, that shuts us off from ourselves and other people
 Shame generates fear -- fear fuels our self-protection and shuts down the openness to experience.  The shame to fear to self-protection progression builds walls around our hearts.  We see vulnerability as dangerous.

 Brené Brown, Daring Greatly  Vulnerability is the core, the heart, the center, of meaningful human experiences.

 

Shame is so important, I spent 13 episodes of this podcast just on that one topic.  Those 13 episodes, episodes 37 to 49 on it
 Those episodes on shame are foundational -- they are the most fundamental episodes of this podcast.  So many of our problem go back to shame, and nearly all psychological dysfunction in the natural realm has its root and origin in shame.  

If you haven't listened to those episodes, or if it's been a long time, go back and listen to them.  

So now, in this episode, I am bringing to you the kinds of experiential exercises, the kind of experiential learning that can help you understand yourself so much better and get you started toward a more solid natural foundation for your spiritual life, much better human formation.
And what I want for you most of all is for you to experience love.  To be able to receive love -- to receive love from others, from yourself, from God.  And to love.  To join those men and women who are on an adventure of love
 1 John 4:18 There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear.

 How does it do that?  How does perfect love cast out fear -- does it just numb fear while leaving your shame intact?  No, I really don’t think that's how it works for me and you. 

Love is the antidote for shame.  Love cures shame.  Three kinds of love.  
Love from God
Love from others, including the saints, especially our Mother Mary
Love from ourselves to ourselves.  

I invite you to join me on this great adventure of loving, especially in this episode, right now, this episode number 93 of this podcast, Interior Integration for Catholics, let us journey together
I am Dr. Peter Malinoski, clinical psychologist and passionate Catholic and together, we can have the relational encounters we need to learn to be loved and to love.  
 Interior Integration for Catholics is part of our broader outreach, Souls and Hearts.  Souls and Hearts brings you the best of psychology and human formation grounded in a Catholic understanding of the human person to you and the rest of the world through our website soulsandhearts.com
We are continuing our series on how the best of secular psychological approaches define mental health, psychological well-being.  We started with Episode 89 on Polyvagal Theory and covered Positive Psychology, Psychodynamic Psychotherapy and Internal Family Systems in Episode 90.  
Today's episode, number 93 is entitled "Three Experiential Exercisesx"  and it's released on May 2, 2022 and today, I am offering you

Three longer experiential exercises today, about 20 minutes each
 Informed by IFS -- can check out episode 71 of this podcast to find out more about IFS -- A new and better way of understanding yourself and others.  Great preparation for these exercises.  Grounded in a Catholic understanding of the human person

Three experiential exercises
  In what ways do you not love yourself? -- where are the gaps in your human formation?  What parts of you are going unloved by you? -- Episode 90 Your Well-being, the Secular experts speak

 

Your inner battle: Protection vs. Connection -- Episode 89 Your Trauma, Your Body: Protection vs. Connection

Rigidity and Chaos -- episode 92 Understanding and Healing your Mind through IPNB

Overall guidelines for these exercises
 
Cautions
 
window of tolerance
 Upside -- Fight or flight, sympathetic activation

 Downside -- Free response -- dorsal vagal activation, shutting down, numbing out, 

don’t have to do this exercise, can stop at any time, reground yourself

 no steamrolling parts

 Also bringing in God from a Catholic perspective, which may activate some parts in some people. 

Good to do this exercise when you have the time and space and privacy -- not while driving or engaging in other activities that would require you to divide your attention.  

Options
 Take what is useful to you

 
Feel free to go your own direction if that seems what's best
There will be some quiet moments in the exercises to give you time to do your inner work.  If it's helpful, feel free to pause the audio and really settle in and do extended work inside if that seems best
Can have pens, pencils and paper to write down things that are helpful -- like a journal -- or to map out things, draw if that's helpful. 
Can do these exercises multiple times, with different parts

A lot of gentleness with and for yourself.  Moment here for your to really care for yourself, to really see what your parts need from you.  
Luke 10:27 Love your neighbor as yourself -- we are supposed to love ourselves in an ordered way
And that means loving the parts of ourself that are in need.  With care and compassion
If you get distracted, that's ok, that's common.  You can just refocus, or if that's not possible, then focus in on that distraction -- get curious about why a part of you needs to distract you.  

Experiential Exercise 1 --In what ways do you reject yourself, or condemn yourself as a person?  In what ways do you not love yourself?  
A part of you finds it hard to love or even accept some other part of you.  That's true for almost everybody, in our fallen world.  Leads to inner conflict

You can't delegate that responsibility of loving yourself to anyone else.  No one else, not even God, can take your place in loving yourself.  
Working on the natural realm here. 
We're not focusing on unloved parts yet.  We are asking that parts that bear the burden of shame -- our shame bearers, can they be patient, to not flood or overwhelm.  
As you ask that question, In what ways do you reject yourself, or condemn yourself as a person?  
What part of you is doing that -- an inner critic?
What is happening in your body?
In response to that question. How am I rejecting or condemning myself. \

Find the bodily response
Focus in on that bodily response.  We call that a trailhead. Connected with your inner critic.  
Might not be a bodily response.  Could be other trailheads
 Images, thoughts, desires, impulses, memories, sounds, beliefs or assumptions -- any internal  experience in response to the question -- what do I need.  

Focus in on that one sensation or inner experience that reflects some kind of self-condemnation or negative judgement of yourself as a person..    
Fleshing out
 
Listen in to what that experience, that body sensation or that impulse or desire or image or memory or belief.
 Really notice that inner critic.  How do you experience it.    

Let's see if we can work with one part at a time.  You can do this reflection and guided exercise over again with multiple parts if you'd like.  But see if your parts inside can agree to let you work with one part.  
We are going to ask that one part not to flood you with its intensity.  That's a safety thing.  We are asking that part not to overwhelm you with its distress.  We want to be separate but near, so that you as the self can have a relationship with that part.  If your target part fuses with you or blends with you, you can't have a relationship.  See if that part will agree not to overwhelm.  Just ask it.  See what the response is.  If it agrees, then
Really sense that part.  See that part or sense that part, however that part is becoming more apparent to you.  How old is that part?  Some parts of us are very, very young.  Even preverbal.  

Really listen to what that target parts wants to share with you, what it wants you to know.  

How are you feeling toward that part, toward that experience
 
C's
 Compassion

 Connection

 Curiosity -- genuine interest

 Calm

 

If feeling negative, can we get concerned protector parts to soften, to relax back so that you, as the self, can connect with your distressed target part?

 If not, focus on the concerned protector part.  Really get interested about why that part is not ready to let you connect with your target part.  There's a reason.  Parts always have good intentions for us.  

Befriending
 Let that part tell you all about what it struggles with.  

Emotions
 Anxiety

 Sorrow -- deep emotional pain

 Anger

 Numbness

 

Thinking -- assumptions, beliefs
 Really be open to these beliefs, asking protectors not to censor them if possible.

 Concentration issues.  

Behaviors -- why does the part do what it does Positive intentions

Spiritual and existential issues
What does this part need from you?
What does this part need from God?

Fears
 What if it doesn't do this job.  

Does it know that you exist -- that it doesn't have to pursue an agenda. 
Where are you with:
 Compassion

 Connectedness

 Curiosity

 Calm

 
Can the part feel love from you?  
Winding up
 Can write down what you learned, what was helpful, what came to you -- giving your parts a voice on paper.  

Can do this exercise again with a different part

 Gratitude for all your parts -- all have good intentions are trying to help

 This doesn't have to be the end of connecting with your target part -- doesn't have to be a one-off experience, can check in with that part again. 

Experiential Exercise 2 -- Protection vs. Connection -- based off of polyvagal theory.  Episode 89
 ANS heavily involved in the ongoing weighing of two fundamental human needs -- two major objectives.  
To survive -- Protection
To bond relationally with others -- Connection
This is the central theme of this discussion of our bodies and our traumas -- Protection and Connection.  How can we have both?  
We have on the one hand a drive to survive -- cause if we don't, you know, we're dead.  On the other hand, we have this yearning to connect, to be in relationship with others 
We need both -- to be protected and to be connected, but trauma puts those two indispensable needs -- protection and connection into tension.  Can't have both.  

If we are experiencing trauma, our ANS automatically moves us away from seeking connection with others to a position of protection. 
In the state of protection -- we are seeking only survival.  Our nervous system is closed to connection with others.  It is closed to change.  There's only one goal.  Survive.  If we don't survive, nothing else is possible.  When we are in a state of protection, it's all about one that one thing: survival.  Nothing else matters.  
However, when we are in a state of connection, we have so many more possibilities
 Health

 Growth

 Restoration

 Change

 

Coming at this a different way

 Going inside

 
Major question -- which parts of me are protecting -- my protectors in IFS
 Managers -- protecting proactively

 Firefighters -- protecting reactively

 Protecting exiles and protecting against exile

 

Experiential Exercise 3 -- Rigidity vs. Chaos -- Episode 92
 
When a system is not optimally self-organizing, it veers toward
 
Rigidity -- everything seems predictable
 
Dorsal vagal shutdown, the freezing and numbing out state like in dissociation
 we discussed this in Episode 89 on polyvagal theory

 This leads to rigidity

 

Examples 
Extreme example would be hysterical paralysis
Another example --  a deep, major depression

Chaos -- everything seems completely unpredictable
 
PTSD symptoms
 Flashbacks

 Nightmares

 

Panic attacks

 

Or both -- e.g. bipolar disorder
 Depressive episode -- rigidity.  

Manic episode -- chaos

Daniel Siegel:  Every symptom of every disorder of the DSM-5 can be framed in terms of chaos or rigidity
"Human suffering can be summed up in chaos and rigidity."  
Health is found in the internal integration, where there is neither chaos nor rigidity.  

When do I feel rigid

 When do I feel chaotic

 Rigidity is often a protector's response against chaos.  

If you really understand the important of experience -- of experiencing change, not just thinking about it, not just considering it, but really experiencing it throughout your being, I have an invitation for you.  
If you really responded to these experiential exercises, I have an invitation for you
I want to invite you to the Resilient Catholics Community -- the RCC
There is nothing else really like it out there
 All about being loved and loving with your whole hear -- all of your being, every fiber of who you are, all your parts.  

It's all about resolving the human formation issues that have thwarted your capacity to be loved and to love.  To be vulnerable, to be connected rather than protecting yourself so much. 

All about restoration -- recovering from being dominated by shame, fear, anger, sadness, pessimism, whatever your struggle is in the depths of your human formation

 
And we do this work experientially -- so many experiential exercises, more than 100 of them for you, you can't get these reflections and guidance anywhere else.
 Informed by Internal Family Systems and the best of the rest of psychological resources

 All grounded in a Catholic understanding of the human person

 All focused on helping you to better accept love and to love more fully, to carry out the two great commandments of our Lord.  

The RCC is a serious commitment -- the whole first year is just that -- a year-long experience of 44 weekly company meetings with those who will be accompanying you on a pilgrimage to much better human formation.
 On that pilgrimage you have a companion to journey with and for daily connection.  

Are you up for the challenge?  Would you like to join me and the rest of the pioneers in this adventure?  Do you want to be a part of the community?  
Are you ready to prevail over whatever hinders your human formation -- would you like to no longer be dominated by fear, anger, shame, sadness, pessimism?  And would you like to be with other like-minded Catholics on the journey --
If so join me.  Join all of us in the Resilient Catholics Community.  The RCC

We are taking applications throughout June of 2022 for our third cohort, those in that cohort will start their adventure in June and July by taking our Initial Measures Kits and be getting feedback on their parts in a personal Zoom session with me.  It's a great chance for us to get to know each other, really know each other at the level of parts.  You'll get a 5 or 6 page report on your internal system and then be eligible for our weekly company meetings and programming to begin in late August or early September.  
Sign up  for the June waiting list -- Souls and Hearts.com/rcc -- or just do an internet search for the Resilient Catholics Community.  

Not ready for that yet?  Sign up for my email reflections every week at soulsandhearts.com -- addressing the topic of lying and deception in this current series.  Every Wednesday.  
Patronness and Patron