Hello everyone,

I wrote an article a while back about how I was going to leave therapy behind and focus solely on our new letterpress business.

This is, what seems, the latest chapter on this huge and winding journey!

I am not sure if this feeling will resonate with you? But once I had sent out that article I thought, ok, so now I have to stick with it. I have chopped and changed my mind so many times, I must now do it or it will be so embarrassing. Other thoughts around how no-one will take me seriously if I change course a bit. And other envious thoughts about those who seem so set on their path and just grow and grow within that. Having said that, from my work with a lot of people in long term careers, or who appear set on their path, they long to break out. Do something different but feel trapped in their lives for many reasons. Many of the reasons similar to the above and, of course, other reasons. I think it is, in fact rare, to be totally happy doing exactly the same for a lifetime. I think the art is to find new ways of being in that to stay engaged with it, energised by it. That is actually what I think I see.

I have also not been very active on Substack as we have had dog chapters close and open and it has been something of a ride in itself. I never knew how dogs can take over your entire life with their problems and helping them to solve them. We also have an 800 mile house move in process. Yep, that is still a chapter that is ongoing!

It is kind of ironic, that I have spent my therapy years specialising in human anxiety and now I have had to turn that towards our lovely Pip dog. I recently, wrote, about how many similarities I have found in that!

If you are interested, this is that article:

I would say I am a creative person. But I have also had a career in the psychology sciences, delivering therapy in many different settings. That is quite a polar opposite thing to navigate. In my therapy career, there are a lot of rules. There are a lot of boundaries to maintain. A professional persona that requires me to act in certain ways. I have been finding the constraints of that stifling in the last couple of years.

So I started to explore my creative side. Before the psychology years I trained and worked as a photographer. That was the steam age of photography and I can still smell the fixer in the developing room! I also worked in desktop publishing after that for quite a while. And I ran my own handmade wedding stationery company to get me through university when I did my first degree in Mental Health Nursing, later in life. Once I qualified the creativity all fell to the wayside.

And I thought I was done with psychology. And I thought I was good with that until it came down to it. In fact, I don’t think I am totally done. I have accrued a large number of years in this field. I have also watched the horrors of what is going on in the world. Here in the UK the cost of living is a total crisis and people need therapy like never before. The NHS is overstretched with years of waiting lists for therapy in some place and months at best.

So many people that could afford private therapy no longer can. In therapy school I was taught that therapy had to be weekly. At this time of the world, not many people can afford that even tho they need it. And so I am not totally done with therapy as I can’t sit with the thoughts of what is needed that does not appear to be attainable. And that I can actually help.

Having taken a few months to think about things, and change my direction a few times now, I think I have a way forward. It is going to take a bit of time, but that is ok.

I am in the process of creating a “self-esteem academy”. This will be therapy sessions in a course. This means I can offer it at low cost as I am not face to face with you. I am writing a course of therapy that is generalised, but that most will be able to afford and do in their own time.

I see my clients as experts on themselves. In my practice it is that expertise my clients use, with some ideas from me, to improve their relationship with themselves. I always say to my clients, we meet once a week for an hour. You are in your life for the other 167 hours of that week. That is what makes this course possible. All my clients have more skills in managing their mind than they realise.

It is that relationship with yourself that can either empower you or hold you back. I do truly believe that self-esteem is the platform we have as human beings that influence how we see the world, how we see ourselves and how we think the world see’s us. If any of that is skewed in some way, we struggle. Low self-esteem is something we are taught at a young age. I have helped 1000s of clients over the years to unlearn that and learn something more helpful.

For example, and this is a common example we use in therapy:

You are walking down the street in a good mood. I want you to imagine you are feeling good about yourself, feel secure in your relationship and feel loved, job is going well, feel good enough and all that lovely stuff (that creates the good mood) : picture that for a moment…..

• Feel that feeling in your body.

• Where do you feel that content lovely feeling?

• Relish it for a moment

So you are walking down the street, with that lovely content feeling and you see someone you know, you wave, they don’t respond. You might think, they didn’t see me, it is ok I will send them a cheeky message. You send the message, move on with your day, unaffected. This is healthy self-esteem fuelling that healthy response.

Now let’s change the mood. Same scenario. Just had a row with your partner (or any other person), they said some mean things to you that hurt. You feel like a really bad person for saying mean things back. You are going over and over it. Then you think about several other times people have been mean to you, not helped you when you needed it most and so on. You feel like shitty person. You feel like you are the worst person on the planet. Then it starts raining. You don’t have a coat or an umbrella and are getting wet.

• Now how do you feel?

• What do you feel in your body?

• What does your mood feel like?

Then you see that person across the road in the same scenario. Now how you do you think about that? My guess is, something like, well no-one bloody likes me cause I am such a terrible person, so of course they are ignoring me. They hate me. After all most people don’t like me. How else would that go for you? The lens thru which you look at this situation has changed using low self-esteem.

This is what my course is going to look at. How the change of lens changes the way we see things. Why we do it. Where it comes from and why. You will be able to map your own story and how you learned low self-esteem. And then the course will look at how you can improve things.

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Most of my clients describe low self-esteem like a rollercoaster. They function really well at times, but really struggle at other times for reasons they cannot understand. My course will help you understand that.

Once you can answer the why of how your mind works, then you can move towards ways to manage your mind differently. Basically, unlearn that low self esteem.

This will be therapy in a course. I am still in the middle of writing it so its a little way off. If you would like updates about this course you can either subscribe here or join my mailing list via my website : here

I feel very uncomfortable to say that, in time, I will put a subscription on this publication as part of the course. But I feel as it will only be in the region of about £7.00 a month, it is pretty affordable for the value, I hope, it will give. That won’t be for a while as I need to prepare for that so I feel you do get value. I will still have lots of free content as well. I won’t paywall everything. The paywalled parts will be more the stuff that supports the course so you have more access to me in relation to that. To enable me to support the course and keep the cost low.

I will also still be working with Star Dreme as well and will post snippets of that here as well.

So that is my current plan, a work in progress, but it feels the right way forward. I feel I can help more people in a much more affordable way. For those who want one to one session still, I will be doing that but only for a day or so a week.

The word “synergy” has been going around in my mind. That is what is going on here, for me, I guess. There are many different subtlety different definitions of that word. But for here, the two parts of myself and how they get expressed, in beautiful letterpressed paper and psychology, can work alongside each other. It doesn’t have to be, one thing or the other. Even though, both things are quite different.

I am also going to be a bit more research based here to keep you up to date with all the amazing things we are learning about being human! Being human, is not easy!

If there are any thoughts you have about things you would like me to cover in this course, I would be delighted to hear from you. You can comment here or email me at : mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

With all my best

Jane

Cognitive Psychotherapist and in the messiness of life.

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Did you know that we now believe that low-self esteem is a learned behaviour? This is incredibly good news! It is exciting to know we can unlearn it!

Do you find yourself second guessing everything you think and do? Worrying about past conversations, at 3 am? Feeling negatively judged by everyone. Having to seek reassurance again and it doesn’t help and you can see how irritated that person is by it? Terrified of compliments as you fear you are rubbish? Feel helpless to the critical voice in your head? All these and more are suggestive of low self-esteem.

Join me here at the Self-Esteem hub where you can can understand all about healthy self-esteem and how to develop it.

Imagine what your life would like if you could boot worry and anxiety out of your life as you trust yourself and can give other people back responsibility for their bad behaviour. After all, that is not your fault is it?

In a really, real way! Yes I meant to write it that way!

The self-esteem hub is currently undergoing a facelift, please bear with me. All current content is available to everyone.

Subscribe now

Since about September of last year, I have skated with despair, deep misery, anxiety, hopelessness, sadness, fear and so many other emotions I am not going to make an endless list with. There have been chinks of light and joyous moments, but all surrounded by this darkness.

Various really difficult life events, stalled plans, huge mountains to climb, seemingly impossible challenges without a solution, loss and new life with Pip and Finch.

Our Pip, above, has had some huge struggles. Struggles I had never considered or even had any thoughts about before he joined us last December. Looking at this photo, you would never know how much he is currently struggling with life. Like many humans, he masks what is really going on for him. Here, he is the picture of confidence and happiness. The reality is so different.

I am sure this will resonant with many humans out there? both from human experience and maybe their own dogs?

We have not left the house for many weeks now to reduce his stressors to allow him “empty his bucket” as our behaviourist advises us. This is to enable him to engage in training so that he can be in the world with the joy he deserves. The parallels with human psychology are amazing. I actually use the “Stress Bucket” idea with my own clients.

I have learnt more about dogs in these months with him than at any other time in my life. I have also learnt a lot about myself.

I have found out so much more about his background and so things now begin to slot into place. I am frustrated that this information was not given to me at the start. But it is what it is. It is very sad for sure. I can’t bear to think of this beautiful soul suffering in his past life.

He has certainly crashed and burned by finding safety. As do many traumatised humans. But he is on the up finally. He is on the road to recovery and I feel like I am walking beside him on that journey with my own recovery from the last few months. As he is beginning to heal, I can feel myself beginning to heal. Just a bit. I feel totally exhausted and feel like I could sleep for a year, but it’s different.

In the last couple of days we have the house blinds open when they are both awake. To see the light from the outside world and see the ocean again is beyond amazing. Small things maybe, but never considered as this special before (the sea view is always amazing, of course, I more mean having light in the house).

Having always had dogs from puppies and being able to form them from the start I had no idea how much dogs who do not have this nurturing struggle. It saddens me so much to know that when Pip cried as a puppy no one came. He has run into doors, got under my feet and must have felt that and never made a sound. He learned it made no difference. Breaks my heart.

When Finch is upset, needs the toilet etc we are always there to support him. Finch is very able to express his needs, as it should be, and he knows a human will come. Pip never had that. Makes me think about human babies and children that experience the same, that a human never comes or is abusive.

I think of dog owners I know and so many of them struggle with their dog behaviour. I had never noticed how common this is. I have always had such settled and calm dogs all my life.

Pip is a rescue and so you can easily say, of course, he has struggles. But not all rescues do. I did a bit of research about separation anxiety in rescues. There is such a massive range in the stats I don’t know what to believe. But why are people who take on rescue dogs not helped to help their new dog so their dogs can thrive? I had absolutely no idea about all the things I do now!

But how about all those dog owners whose worlds have become small to avoid their dogs explosions who had them from puppies? I have got up at 5.30 am to go for a walk with Pip to make sure I don’t encounter anyone or another dog. I now realise there are so many other humans out there doing the same thing.

I have come to realise that dog training to dogs is like psychological therapy for humans.

Therapy for humans helps them to thrive and be who they want to be.

Dog training has the same effect on our dogs. I feel stupid for not realising that a long time ago. I have, of course, trained my dogs in the past and they have thrived. But with Pip, it has been on a different scale. He has not responded to any usual training. He is now, but it has been a long road to find the right help.

My world is very small right now. But it is going to get back to where it was and we will move house this year. Whilst my belief in being able to escape my current environment is very low, I figure if I keep saying, it will happen, it will. It has to, I cannot live here anymore. I need to go home to England.

I keep asking myself what the lessons are from this period. Why has it happened the way it has, even. I don’t think my mind has cleared enough to be able to see that just yet. My views on many things have totally changed. Maybe that is one of the lessons.

I will be resuming writing for the Self-esteem hub very soon. With a new vigour I think! A new perspective somewhat.

Here they are, sleeping peacefully together! Well kind of! Pip does not yet allow snuggles due to raptor teeth 🤣 May the adult teeth come soon 🤣 I am sure Pip, as co-parent, totally agrees. He has the patience of a saint dog!

I hope everyone is able to have a peaceful weekend. I know many in the world wish to have this and can’t at the moment. My thoughts are with them.

With all my best

Jane

Cognitive Psychotherapist and in the messiness of life.

Did you know that we now believe that low-self esteem is a learned behaviour? This is incredibly good news! It is exciting to know we can unlearn it!

Do you find yourself second guessing everything you think and do? Worrying about past conversations, at 3 am? Feeling negatively judged by everyone. Having to seek reassurance again and it doesn’t help and you can see how irritated that person is by it? Terrified of compliments as you fear you are rubbish? Feel helpless to the critical voice in your head? All these and more are suggestive of low self-esteem.

Join me here at the Self-Esteem hub where you can can understand all about healthy self-esteem and how to develop it.

Imagine what your life would like if you could boot worry and anxiety out of your life as you trust yourself and can give other people back responsibility for their bad behaviour. After all, that is not your fault is it?

In a really, real way! Yes I meant to write it that way!

The self-esteem hub is currently undergoing a facelift, please bear with me. All current content is available to everyone.

Subscribe now

and Find me at my website, here.

I realise this very brief piece of writing is a bit last minute. But I have been thinking about it for a while.

To be totally honest, 2025 has been totally shit for me and my family. It has honestly, totally sucked. Almost from the start! And I know we all get those years, and we get better years, great years, meh years and years that just float by in peace and nothing much to report.

I am putting hand up for the latter of those in 2026.

Having said that, we have a fair bit to do in in 2026. We are moving house (800 mile move, that had to be postponed this year, that has nearly driven me to madness to have to stay where we are), we have a lovely Pip with us now and hopefully an Irish Red Setter Puppy in March (this has been planned for a very long time now, this lovely breeder does not breed often and we missed the last litter!). And then we have our new business to get launched as well.

To say Star Dreme has been stop, start, stop, start is the understatement of the century. But we are not far off getting going now. We have been slowed down by stuff happening! But that is ok.

My Substack is going to have a total facelift as I move away from therapy and towards the creation and production of colourful, shiny wedding and event stationery, going back to the old days of beautiful personal stationery, luxurious business stationery, to name but a few. I think I am going to have change my substack name, what do you think?

I am also going to have a new look podcast in the next few months. This will be about how to manage the stress of organising weddings and events, along with help about how to say no, amongst others! I hope to have a few guests as well talking about their roles in the wedding and event industry. If that is you, please do get in touch, I would love to hear from you.

I have been looking at social media as well. I did a bit of Instagram posting, not a lot, in December to promote our Santa letters. And as we all know, the second you take your foot off the pedal with that, all the momentum instantly drops off.

What I think we will do is hit pause on social media for a bit, at least for a time. Instead to focus all that thinking time, actual time and energy that social media takes to actually build our website that will be the hub of our business after all. To design and develop our product range. To focus on Substack. I want to see what it feels like to not have that social media pressure for a bit. It distracts me from what is much more productive and actually fun! To actually focus on what is real, and social media, is not real! It is a horrible world of pretence, of having to fit in, and be cool to get seen. To be purely judged on how many followers you have rather than what you actually do! I just am not the Instagram cool and I am ok with that. I am glad in fact!

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If you are looking to buy something, I think, and am reliably told by various coaches, that Instagram is not it. Your website is. So that is where you will find me hanging out this coming year. Here on Substack where there are real people, and I have to say, really lovely people, my website and my studio! My lovely Pip can hang out with me in all those places, because they are real places (well be might struggle with the website, but he offers moral support in return for ham 🤣) That is going to be it. Doesn’t that sound amazing?

I am refocussing on what is important, real and productive. AND FUN AND REWARDING. Turning the volume down on all the noise out there.

Here is Pip, offering website writing support!!!! I actually need to fatten him up as I don’t think his nutrition has sadly been that great in his life. I have achieved that for myself (fattened up) 🤣 back to HIT classes for me!

I want to say a huge thank you to all my readers and for the amazing kindness, empathy and wisdom you all have shown me. I truly have been so touched and comforted by all your words ❤️ T

I do wish I had a magic wand to grant you all your wishes for 2026. As I can’t do that, I do hope some wishes come true, some lovely things happen and that the storms of life come and go and move into calmer waters.

See you on the other side.

Jane & Pip

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This is a very difficult thing to write, so please forgive me if it is not my best work, but it is written from the heart.

I can remember sitting and writing this December review last year. I feel like about 10 years have elapsed since then. 2025 has not been the best of years in many ways, personally. As those of you who follow Riley on notes, will be aware that we lost him to a very aggressive form of cancer 4 weeks ago, today. It was a huge event for us, following on from other big and difficult life events over the course of 2025. I have taken a break from writing here as I just did not have the headspace at all. Heartbroken does not even cover it.

I might write about this type of cancer in dogs, next year, to raise awareness. There is a very small window of opportunity to treat it and most primary vets cannot spot it, in time, at the moment. This is not their fault. One vet involved with Riley said it is every vet’s worst nightmare as it hides and then when it shows itself, it is too late. It certainly turned into our own personal nightmare as a family.

I want to thank every single person who sent such kind words and thoughts when we lost him and all through his life. Such an outpouring of love and kindness gave me so much comfort and really restored my faith in humans that has waned of late (due, in large part, to the difficult place we are currently living in). Riley’s legacy feels like it is of bringing out joy, delight, love and kindness in everyone he came into contact with. I am sorry that I cannot respond to everyone individually, at the moment, but I appreciate you all sooo much. My heart needs a bit of recovery time and my eyes are begging me not to cry so much so I hope this is enough of a thank you to you all!

Our daughter, who is an illustrator, drew this beautiful picture in celebration of our (and he was in the hearts of so many people here at Substack) beautiful boy.

credit: Laura Watkins, https://www.instagram.com/watkinsillustrations

Grief is a weird thing, isn’t it? I know I am not unique in this experience, of course, but for me that emotional agony that is also a physical pain, feels like an old friend. It has visited me far too many times over the course of my, nearly, 60 years.

My view is that we feel grief over most changes, to differing extents (is that even a word?). Even if that change is chosen. Here in the UK, it feels like grief is a dirty secret that you have to hide and all you can do is pretend you are ok. It is almost a forbidden thing to talk about. You can only confide in some very carefully chosen people around you. So many times I have heard, oh he was only a dog, or get a new dog and it will be fine. Or, well if you are gonna have a dog, it will die so don’t get another one and save yourself the pain. Or, lose yourself in your work and you will be be ok. And yet, here on Substack, only kindness and thoughtful words that has brought so much comfort.

My view is that feeling the pain of loss means you loved something very much. And I don’t want to go through my life not experiencing love to try and avoid pain. I think that pain is an inevitable part of being human. It cannot be avoided, only be moved through. Whilst my friend, grief, is never something I want to invite in or look forward to meeting, it comes and it will leave, even though meeting with it will have changed me and a piece of my heart may forever be missing. It will also bring change, growth, build resilience and hopefully some new wisdom. The latter feeling like a phoenix rising out of the ashes of heartbreak, despair and hopelessness.

That is all I feel I can write about this loss right now.

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Looking forward to 2026 we have a lot more change to come. Chosen change this time.

• We will be moving home to England, hopefully early summer 2026

• Our new business will properly launch. Star Dreme, our new business name, will be making hand pressed letterpress wedding stationery, events stationery and anything to with celebration! Moving into the world of joy and love is something I am really looking forward to. I am also hoping that all my experience as a therapist will help brides with the stresses of arranging a wedding. More to come on that.

• I am looking for anyone involved in the wedding industry who would like to do a podcast with me about their work. Please do get in touch if that is you.

• My Substack will undergo a full facelift

And then I have another story for you. Some will go, oh wow, and others will think I am mad. It is ok either way.

A friend of mine who is another setter owner, sent me a link to a rescue dog. I was like, no way. He is a 3 year old Irish Red and White setter. I got talked into it. But I have been very reluctant. It felt too soon, felt too much, felt disrespectful to my Riley’s memory. But I have got past that now. During the first phone call to the shelter it was raining. Then the sun came out and a rainbow formed. Riley’s lead inexplicably fell off the coat stand. She told me that the dog’s name had been Rummer but that she had renamed him to Riley as he was not responding to the first name (he had not had a name prior to the rescue). I have had lovely pictures of him and he looks so sweet and kind. Then this morning the foster home sent me a video of him and for some reason, something has shifted and I cannot wait to bring him home on Saturday. I hope you will join me in welcoming Pip (I have to rename him, I can’t manage the same name) into his new Substack family. Pictures to follow on Sunday.

I do hope that everyone reading this has a peaceful festive season. I for one, will be welcoming 2026 with open arms and hope.

With much love.

Jane

Hello everyone.

It has been a while since I wrote any articles. And there is a reason for that, of course! The intention of this short article is to update and explain what I have been up to!

My reason is that I have now opened the virtual doors on our new Letterpress Studio business, to start with, in Etsy. The website should be live very soon. I can almost you hear you say, a what? It is often the reaction I have received when I say I am a Cognitive Psychotherapist!

What is a letterpress studio?
The geek answer to this is that Letterpress printing is called a relief printing process. Ink is pressed into paper and creates an indented impression into the paper that is filled with ink. It is beautiful, elegant and tactile. Invented around 1440 by Johannes Gutenberg until it declined in the 1960/70s. It was an amazing form of art, in my opinion. The type was set by hand, letter by letter. Many people do recognise the “Heidelberg” name in relation to a letter press machine. Quite famous, we will be sourcing one or similar in the coming months.

You can see a picture here : Original Heidelberg Platen Press - Wikipedia

There are other many famous machines as well, geek attack over!

I have always loved quality, tactile art. I also love sparkle and shine and so we are starting our business with a letterpress foiling machine. Instead of ink, we hand press shiny (and all other kinds of foil) into soft cotton paper. This leaves a shiny (or otherwise, depending on design) impression that glints and glows as you move the paper.

I have been a psychotherapist for 25 years. I am transitioning into retiring from this, it may take a while! And so I am starting the business alongside. I am sad, of course, to be moving away from psychology. But then, am I?

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Everything we do, requires the input of the mind in some way. And I know my mind is exhausted, overwhelmed, stress and excited as I have embarked on this journey. I am experiencing, abject fear, frustration, imposter syndrome, feeling stupid a lot of the time, having to ask for help, practice patience and also joy, pride, satisfaction and excitement, to name just a few. I can swing between all these in the space of a millisecond, it feels like. This has been in the works, quietly in the background for two years.

And so I thought, what better way to write about using psychology than by sharing this journey with you? The self-esteem hub was, always for me, about giving help to manage the daily struggles we all have. That is not really going to change. As I work thru the challenges and successes of this journey, it is all psychological and based on my knowledge and understanding of the mind. I intend to share this with you. We all learn from each other. We pick up coping strategies other use and make them our own and feel better to know we are not alone in the struggles we experience.

I am not going to change the name for a bit or I may leave it as it is, what do you think? I am sorting the publication out, so please bear with me. Everything I have written to date is in the archive.

The home page you land on, is going to be a bit chaotic for a bit, apologies in advance. But it will get sorted out into an order. It will remain free to read.

I do have some exciting plans for this publication, I hope you will stay a while and see what you think. All feedback is gratefully appreciated.

With warmest wishes

Jane

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"The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing." - John Powell (most likely source)

The self-esteem hub looks at how our tricky brains effect our perception of ourselves, our sense of self-worth, our evaluation of our abilities, how we fit into the world and how we think others see us. We can experience this as a rollercoaster, functioning really well at times and then plagued with self-doubt and anxiety the next moment. Managing our tricky minds is the art and science of being human. I look forward to taking this journey with you.

Hello everyone,

One of the most common themes I come across with my clients is the fear of making mistakes.

One of my most favourite things to do is to help clients to see that the word ‘mistake’ has no place in the dictionary. I do truly believe there is no such thing as a mistake.

We try things out. Sometimes they work out and it feels greaaaaat. Other times it does not go according to plan and we feel crap for a bit but then we figure it out. Because really, what else can we do? And whilst getting things right feels great, finding solutions to problems and challenges also feels pretty bloody good. We actually learn more from the latter and it boosts our self-esteem to know we can manage adversity.

I am talking about this today as I have been learning calligraphy. I have been feeling really rubbish over the last month due to some health issues and so it has been really difficult to find the coordination and learning place in my brain!

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However, after a month of practising basic strokes, whilst not perfect, I can see an improvement! When I first started out I had more ink on me and the table that in lines on the paper! My pointed nib kept sticking in the paper and I could not form the thin or thick lines. However, here is where I am currently, below. Needs a million more times practice, but I am ok to say, hey, I did this!

Next week we start forming letters. It is exciting and I am so enjoying it. It is a very mindful thing to do. Not to say that I have had a lot of moments of wanting to give up, tear it all up and been so disappointed with what I saw on the paper. But, it is something I want to do, so I just kept going.

I have tried to give myself some grace that this is really new. It is not handwriting, it is a form of art. Our teacher encourages us to use a red pen to identify the parts we need to work on, not think of the red pen as mistakes!

A nice reframe that I use with my clients all the time.

Here is an article I wrote a while back about that self-critic who, whose help sometimes we need to say thank you but no thank you too.

Does this article make you think of any unhelpful ways you are currently using that nasty ‘mistake’ word? How could you reframe that? I would love to hear if you feel able to share.

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And now I am off to spend time with Mable, our letterpress. She has much wisdom being around 100 years old of learning 1000 ways not to print! I am listening to her slow and gentle lessons about how to learn.

Wishing you all a wonderful day.

Wishing you all a peaceful rest of your day.

➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

With all kind wishes,

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

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"The only constant in life is change." - Heraclitus

The self-esteem hub looks at how our tricky brains effect our perception of ourselves, our sense of self-worth, our evaluation of our abilities, how we fit into the world and how we think others see us. We can experience this as a rollercoaster, functioning really well at times and then plagued with self-doubt and anxiety the next moment. Managing our tricky minds is the art and science of being human. I look forward to taking this journey with you.

Hello everyone,

We have had some amazing weather of late, here in the Highlands of Scotland. It can get pretty warm, but 27 degrees on so many days in unheard of. They say we will grow wine grapes here in years to come. Interestingly, in many years gone by our climate was much warmer than it is now.

If you read the quote above, it is so true isn’t it? However good or difficult things are, it always changes. Nothing is forever, right? Whilst this can feel scary, you have weathered that so far, haven’t you? Think back, to all the challenges you have navigated. As my clients will be very aware, one of my favourite phrases is that there are 3 certainties in life: tax, death and uncertainty (change).

Personally, I generally manage change well. I can see how I am becoming more risk adverse as I get older. I have wondered to myself why that is. I haven’t really come up with an answer yet!

Due to some health issues of late, a change to my life has to happen. I can no longer be chained to my computer 8-12 hours a day by my corporate job and all the chains that are imposed on me. I have been resisting the big change I am now making. Hell, it is scary, isn’t it?

Moving away from a salaried job to working for myself in a totally new business, the word ‘SHIT’ comes to mind! haha

I will still have my private practice, I will create some courses about anxiety and how to manage it, drawn from 20+ years experience and all the things I have found have really helped my clients, but the big new thing is our creative business.

How has this come about?

I love the texture and feel of things. This is something that can get very lost in this new tech and digital age. So we are going to be creating some beautiful, romantic and tactile products that can be treasured and enjoyed in your hands.

Watch this space…………….more about that very soon.

You might be wondering about the future of the Self-Esteem Hub. I am still going to be a practising Psychotherapist and so it will continue. It is something very close to my heart, to try to contribute to helping us understand what makes us tick and how we can change things we want to. It is just going to be more varied, with creative stuff in here too.

Starting a new business is certainly going to test my self-esteem and coping strategies. I believe that we all continue to grow and learn until we take our last breath. I will not be doing any ‘failing’. If you are a regular reader you will know I think that word should be struck from the dictionary. My belief is that, we don’t fail, we learn 10,000 ways not to do something! We grow and we learn. That is it, we don’t ‘fail’.

The fear of failure and the that feeling we get from it (ignited from earlier memories) can prevent us stepping through new and uncertain doors to find out what lies through them. “What if I fail at this new thing” can lead to paralysis and staying stuck in a place we don’t want to be.

Failure is something we learned from others who wanted to control us, remember them? Sometimes from a well meaning place, sometimes not. The word fail makes us feel fear, anxiety and the desire to please to feel better. That makes us bend to others will and not do what we need to do for us.

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I know the journey ahead is going to be filled with anxiety, fear and challenges, but it is also going to be filled with wonder, satisfaction, joy, pride and enjoyment. The latter words are pushing me through this new door.

I think reflecting on all the things we have achieved and overcome in our lives and how we did that, leads us towards what we truly want as we can identify all our strengths and skills. Cause we all have those skills and strengths, we just tend to dwell on the opposite.

A small challenge for you - with a pen and paper write down whatever words came to your mind when you read the last paragraph. What do you notice?

If you find that comparing youself to others gets in your way, you might find my podcast thought provoking:

Wishing you all a peaceful rest of your day.

➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

With all kind wishes,

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

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"Procrastination is the thief of time." — Edward Young, Night Thoughts (1742) - yes it is as probably as old as the human race is!

The self-esteem hub looks at how our tricky brains effect our perception of ourselves, our sense of self-worth, our evaluation of our abilities, how we fit into the world and how we think others see us. We can experience this as a rollercoaster, functioning really well at times and then plagued with self-doubt and anxiety the next moment. Managing our tricky minds is the art and science of being human. I look forward to taking this journey with you.

Hello Everyone,

I hope that your week is going well. I have been watching lots of YouTube videos of late, learning about various different things. And then up came this advert break that was talking about the ‘law of sustainment’. I cannot find who ‘invented’ this and it seems, from my research, that it is not a ‘law’ that is recognised in any academic sense but it is used as a concept in some domains (psychology, behaviour, coaching and psychology). It appears, and I am quite happy to be corrected, that whoever is quoting this ‘law’ is using their interpretation of it.

So what is it? weeeeelllll, tricky! In essence my interpretation is that it seems to refer to various different things. One is the idea of behavioural reinforcement (kind of Skinner, Operant Conditioning type things - where behaviours are strengthened if the consequence is good or weakened by an adverse outcome). The other main idea of this ‘law’ is that we tend to get into behaviours (or do things) that are in alignment with our held beliefs about ourselves and our abilities.

If for example, we feel we are a rubbish writer, that blank page is not going to feel an inviting thing to fill. If we believe we are a good writer and people want to read out stuff, the white page becomes an invitation we want to accept.

I did find it interesting to think about these two things today in relation to procrastination. We all suffer with that, right?

When I think about my own procrastination it often is themed around things that I either don’t think I should have to do (often in my role as an employee) or around things I am not sure I have the ability to do. Of course, there are times when I just don’t want to bloody do the thing cause it is boring, tedious and all the other words that might be springing to mind. The latter though, is also related to not feeling I should have to do this ‘thing’, so it is the same really.

It is interesting though, that no matter how much reward I could be tempted with, there are some things I always procrastinate over, eg writing a report or notes. But then again, it is because I usually see them as having no function as I know it is a tick box exercise or some similar thing. It doesn’t mean to say I am always right about this reluctance, it is just how I feel.

I have written the above examples, just off the top of my head, and then reflected as I wrote. I am not going to correct them, as this is just what my thoughts were as I wrote them.

So it is interesting, isn’t it, that is comes back to my core values (what is important to me about how I show up in the world and how I am as a person) and my assessment of my own abilities (often incorrect, in terms of I under value my abilities or ability to learn a lot of the time).

I am currently busy developing some letterpress products. The amount of procrastination I experienced over that was huge. Then some kind of switch flicked, and I just went for it. Now I am immersed and there is no procrastination as I have found I can do it, that learning and developing it is fun. Exit procrastination, enter enthusiasm, motivation and wanting to do it.

Procrastination is one the biggest things that comes up in therapy. My clients ask me for ‘tools’ to not procrastinate. However, it is never that simple. As much as I would like to wave that ‘magic wand’ the only way to overcome procrastination is to understand where it is coming from.

You could argue, it is a protective behaviour to keep us emotionally ‘safe’ from anxiety, feelings of failure and so on. However, as with all unhelpful behaviours, it creates an unhelpful cycle that blocks us from achieving great things.

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What patterns do you notice about your procrastination? Where is it coming from? How can you ‘flick that switch’ to start. The starting can be the most difficult thing in the world sometimes. I have written to provoke thinking, questioning, reflecting, not to have all the answers!

➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

I do wish you all a great week.

With all kind wishes,

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

Leave a comment

"Nothing is so common as the wish to be remarkable" - William Shakespeare (I think)

The self-esteem hub looks at how our tricky brains effect our perception of ourselves, our sense of self-worth, our evaluation of our abilities, how we fit into the world and how we think others see us. We can experience this as a rollercoaster, functioning really well at times and then plagued with self-doubt and anxiety the next moment. Managing our tricky minds is the art and science of being human. I look forward to taking this journey with you.

Hello everyone,

I missed writing a post last week. The week just got away from me. I have been working more on our creative business. To get it up and running. It is exciting. I am learning Calligraphy, really rubbish at the moment but am very accepting I am learning and not viewing myself as a failure at all. In fact, am celebrating sticking with the practice of it, more or less! It is a very soothing thing to do. Very mindful. Can I imagine being good enough to write personalised things for folks? Haha, not at the moment, but it will come.

I have also been in touch with suppliers and am now eagerly awaiting paper and ink supplies. A little fear in there about if I can create some beautiful things with them. Watch this space!

In case you are curious, we are starting a letterpress printing company (we are calling it ‘Star Dreme’). Wedding invitations and stationery and anything else we can find to print with this beautiful craft. The press below is not ours, sadly, so beautiful, isn’t it? I can almost smell the ink and wood from this picture, can you?

What I have noticed over the last week is a huge increase in my intrusive thoughts.

Whenever I talk about intrusive thoughts, people generally assume I am talking about my specialist OCD Therapy Practice. And yes, of course, the distress caused by intrusive thoughts to those with OCD is huge and something I have had the privilege to help so many with over the years.

I think the thing that most of my new OCD clients are surprised by is that we ALL have intrusive thoughts. Intrusive thoughts are those thoughts that just pop into our head. We can access our minds by searching for knowledge, memories and so on, but our brain also makes “suggestions” to us. How much attention we pay to those suggestions can depend on many things. We call those suggestions intrusive thoughts.

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They are not all bad! I think that most human creativity comes from these types of thoughts. Your last good idea ——- it was an intrusive thought! A thought about what to write next, just popped in there right? What and how to draw the next thing, I do love those chickens I restack! Those came from an intrusive thought. We like those.

Generally we filter out the noise of these thoughts, but this can be more difficult at times than others. And for people with OCD it can feel an impossible thing to be able to do. Often in OCD, those intrusive thoughts are in direct conflict with the persons values making them feel so bad. No-one has ‘a little bit of OCD’, you either have OCD or you do not. But if you are human, you will experience intrusive thoughts, without OCD you will manage them differently.

When I reflect on the increase of awareness of my intrusive thoughts I can put it down to several things. An increase in contact with judgemental people I would not normally spend time with, more than usual difficulties in the corporate company I work for part-time, uncertainty around our house sale, Riley being unwell, tiredness as all this is effecting my sleep amongst other things.

These things are triggering my fears about myself (known as core beliefs in therapy) and I am having to work harder to manage my mind. I am in a Facebook group that supports my calligraphy course. I don’t usually venture onto Facebook and so have been exposed to my feed! Oh my self-critic has loved that. I was surprised at how much I got hooked into all that the first few days and how bad it made me feel, it has been a while since I have been on it!

Not all intrusive thoughts are bad. That is good right? There are a lot of different theories about why we experience the more distressing ones. If anyone is interested then I am happy to write about that another time, but don’t want to send you to sleep!

If we don’t have OCD it is easier to learn to regulate our thoughts/minds. I have observed my triggers above and am taking responsibility to make helpful changes. And so I have made a few changes to help to try to reduce the thoughts that make me feel anxious. I now navigate straight to the Facebook group (comparing and all that stuff gone). I have tried to just let some things that I would normally do, go. Slightly more rest, need more, aware of that. Doing more soothing rhythm breathing and attaching it to parts of my day to make it a routine so I can remember it eg before the start of every session, when I make coffee or food (calms my nervous system). Reduced alcohol as it effects my sleep. Really enjoying my calligraphy practice, it is a really mindful occupation. Increased the amount of water I drink as I can forget to do that. I have sorted out a lot of nagging tasks that needed to be done, reduced the to-list, feels good! Next thing I want to add is some Yoga.

Small changes can make a big difference to us. After all, if we just keep doing what we do, nothing can change, can it?

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➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

I do wish you all a great week.

With all kind wishes,

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

Leave a comment

"We are made wise not by the recollection of our past, but by the responsibility of our future." —George Bernard Shaw

The self-esteem hub looks at how our tricky brains effect our perception of ourselves, our sense of self-worth, our evaluation of our abilities, how we fit into the world and how we think others see us. We can experience this as a rollercoaster, functioning really well at times and then plagued with self-doubt and anxiety the next moment. Managing our tricky minds is the art and science of being human. I look forward to taking this journey with you.

Hello Everyone!

Do you ever wake up and think, OMG I feel like shit. Let me google how to feel better? Then you try the ‘life hack’ and it doesn’t really land but you keep trying and persisting with it. Maybe for 5 minutes or 5 days! But you don’t feel better and then add to it by feeling a failure?

This is sooooo common. Maybe that at least makes you feel better. So many of my clients have read a dozen self-help book for little gain or the gain does not last.

It is a bit like therapy manuals written for therapists about how to do therapy with their clients. Unfortunately, the client has not read the manual!

And that is totally fine, because manuals are guides. They are there to give therapists things to think about not apply verbatim. Every single person is different. We are different in our experiences, how we interpret our experiences and how we try to keep ourselves safe in the world. I am talking about emotional safety. Sometimes these safety behaviours are healthy and helpful and at other times they are less so.

Have you ever tried to get someone to guess what you want by acting in a certain way? How often does the other person get it? When they don’t get it, how does that make you feel? It does not usually end well.

So many of my clients come to me with this as one of their difficulties. That is, not being able to get their needs met in a helpful way.

The life hack might be - “be more assertive, say what you want”. How does that help someone scared of rejection, anger or starting an argument? That fear is coming from somewhere. That context is what is causing the issue. The life hack is so general it cannot help the person as it cannot help them solve the fear that is blocking them from asserting themselves in the first place. Instead, the life hack, which the person usually knows anyway, makes them feel worse as they already know they need to be more assertive, in this example. Being more assertive would enable you to say no, not be so overwhelmed, feel heard, feel more confident amongst others.

How might you deal with the next life hack you read?

Maybe:

• Does this tip understood my lived experience that has created fear or emotional and is adjusted for me?

• Do I feel emotionally safe enough to try this, or am I feeling pressure to be someone I’m not or be a way that is not me?

• Would it be more helpful to get support in understanding what’s really going on beneath the surface?

➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

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I do wish you all a great week.

With all kind wishes,

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

Leave a comment

“Rule of art: can’t kills creativity!” - Camille Paglia

The self-esteem hub looks at how our tricky brains effect our perception of ourselves, our sense of self-worth, our evaluation of our abilities, how we fit into the world and how we think others see us. We can experience this as a rollercoaster, functioning really well at times and then plagued with self-doubt and anxiety the next moment. Managing our tricky minds is the art and science of being human. I look forward to taking this journey with you.

Hello everyone,

I am not sure if this is just become a thing recently or whether I have just noticed it.

I have worked in my current Corporate company for about 4 years. Each year I have to sign a document about conflict of interest, which is fine, I have no issue with that. I have a private practice alongside this job. Every year I have just signed it off and that was it. This year, I signed it and then got an email ‘reminding’ me that I can’t see the corporate clients in my own practice. I was like, no shit eh? Isn’t that what the form is for, I do know this, I agree with it, I know it’s a thing, why do I need to be told this like I am a child who cannot work that out?

I think this has rankled with me as I have had a long succession of being told what I can’t do from various sources of late.

It seems to be the automatic thing now. ‘Oh no, you can’t do that’.

It is becoming rare for someone to say, hmmm, yes this is a problem what can we do about it? It is just, f*** off, no. End of.

Our dishwasher has broken. Apparently it can only be fixed on a Monday. No other option, tough. I can’t do a Monday, its a corporate day where every second of the day is accounted for and micro-managed. No way I can do a Monday. My other half has spent half of today calling around to find someone who is not horrified we cannot say yes to this unreasonable demand. I am not risking a day’s leave on this, and why should I have to? for them to probably not turn up.

In fact, when you ask for a workaround to anything, people now look at you with total disgust for daring to suggest it. As if there is something wrong with you for trying to find a way to problem solve, to find an alternative, to be less rigid, to be able to live our own lives around others. It is their way, or no way, more and more.

Has anyone else noticed this trend?

I realise this is a bit of a rant, based in personal frustration, but what does it say on a wider scale?

Is the basis of it, being ‘risk’ averse? So let me just clarify what I mean by risk. I don’t mean walking in front of a train. We take a risk when we get out of bed in the morning. We could slip and fall over and break our leg, right? We don’t because we risk assess how to do this safely. Having said that, I did break my foot and ankle in three places dancing a few years ago! A common injury when we stamp our feet, but I digress. We risk assess, absolutely everything we do. Be it conscious or not.

What else could this automatic can’t thing be based on? Fear of thinking for ourselves? Being brain washed that there is a rule book that must be stuck to at all costs? Are we threatened so much by the rule makers about what consequences will be heaped on us if we don’t make everyone comply? Does it make us feel safer to tell everyone there is only one way, we have been told about, to do things? Do we then feel absolved of all personal responsibility. We we ever consider the consequences of the other party anymore?

In turn, does it mean our world is becoming far more rigid and what are the implications of that? Is it a fear around creating choices for others and the responsibility of that? Is it a fear of using common sense (something that appears to be getting less common). Are we being taught not to use our imagination anymore? OMG how sad and unsatisfying that would be. It takes imagination to problem solve. Are we all just becoming so scared of life we cling to rules even if we know they make no sense?

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I increasingly find rule books being cited to me automatically without any thought or creativity. At work when I was presented with my diary (that I have zero say in even though I have to do it) and I said, hang on, there is no freedom or room to breathe, I was just told yes, that is how it is.

Is it just my generation? I have just started watching ‘Clarkson’s farm"'. I was never his fan but I have to say I am really enjoying watching him navigate the “can’t” systems around him. It is great to see someone else question things, and find ways around them. My view is, how do we grow if we don’t try things out? It is not going to lead to failure, it is going to lead to growth and learning.

Is this ‘can’t business’ the world of the future? Scary! What do you think? Have you noticed this and how do you manage it as the creative human being you are? Because we all have this ability to be creative, whatever that creativity looks like.

As an ending note today, when I do find those creative people who help, go the extra mile, sort things out, I so value them, they make my heart smile and I feel good to be human. I have to give a shout out to our estate agent, who currently is going the extra mile, even though she will probably never read this! But I have told her!

I do wish you all a great week.

With all kind wishes,

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

Leave a comment

"No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear." - C.S. Lewis

The self-esteem hub looks at how our tricky brains effect our perception of ourselves, our sense of self-worth, our evaluation of our abilities, how we fit into the world and how we think others see us. We can experience this as a rollercoaster, functioning really well at times and then plagued with self-doubt and anxiety the next moment. Managing our tricky minds is the art and science of being human. I look forward to taking this journey with you.

Hello everyone,

Life is full of them isn’t it? beginnings and endings.

Some of the endings we encounter can be the most difficult experiences we have. The new beginnings that come from them can bring the most wonderful experiences. We do have to close a chapter to open a new one and that can be difficult.

I am writing this in advance! wow, managed it! Today is Wednesday and this post will be delivered to you on Monday as usual. On Friday, we are driving from our current Scottish home, 700 miles to Devon in England! We are moving from this beautiful house, in Scotland, that we have literally expended sweat, blood and tears and a whole load of money renovating. It is our dream home on the beach that has turned into a bit of nightmare. So it is time for this chapter to close. It has taken a long time to make this decision and the pain, both emotional and financial, of this move is real, on so many levels.

Thanks to stamp duty increases and increased prices on everything, we are swapping years of hard earned house owning equity to a mortgage to pay the government a whole load of money to simply move house. I feel like we are being penalised for wanting to move house or maybe even owning a house. Something we have both done for about 30 years. It is not what we envisioned at nearly 60 years old. To actually increase my mortgage just to move house. I know, I am not alone in the grief (loss) I feel over this.

When we talk about grief, we think of the loss of a loved one, be it human or furry friend. What we don’t always think about is that we experience a lot of grief about a lot of things. An actual grief reaction. When we leave Junior School for High School we lose the position of being top of the school and knowing how things work, being top dog, to being the newbie and not knowing anything. There is a grief reaction in that due to the loss of position in Junior School. When we go to Uni and leave our childhood behind us, we grieve over that. We don’t name it that though, do we? We say, I am anxious, angry, sad, scared, resentful, miss home. That is grief.

It is just part of being human. We can find change difficult. Sameness feels safe, change and the unknown does not always feel safe.

I know I have to start a lot of new things. And I was so stuck in the grief of all the loss that I am about to experience I was paralysed. I have only just worked this out! I just was so sad I couldn’t start all the new things I needed to start. I was pretty mean to myself about it, I have to say. My self-critic was having a field day. My to-do list felt overwhelming. Everything I thought about was overwhelming. The final straw came when I had to increase my corporate hours. That has been awful. More paralysis. The time pressure that has caused has been huge.

The plan for England is to stop the Corporate job, get my private practice back up and running and start our wedding stationery and gift business. I know I need to start the wedding business preparation now to release me from the hated corporate job later in the year, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. I was angry and resentful about the corporate job taking up all my time (I have to work well beyond my hours to meet their unreasonable demands), furious about the way they manage or don’t manage things, that it prevented me doing anything else, that I had to do so much work on this house in such limited time to get it ready to go to market, loss of my freedom, loss of my house, oh the list goes on. I was so busy grieving over all of this, I got myself really stuck.

On reflection, I should have just given myself grace to take whatever time I needed to adjust a bit to what is going on now and what lies ahead to get us home.

Look at the mess my workbench was in:

Every time I looked at it I thought OMG what a bloody mess, I need to tidy that up. But I didn’t. It kind of represented my mind, my mindset. A mess! Stagnation. Grieving.

Then yesterday (Tuesday last week when you read this). This happened!

I tidied it up and cleaned it! The dust! A mindset shift had happened - will be glad to hear that my whinging has stopped!

I am ready to close a lot of chapters now. I feel ready. It has been a long time coming, I can say!

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I know it is ok to feel sad, but when you are in it, it is horrible and confusing. If you need some help to work through your grief or work out what is happening for you, you can find the links below to work with me 1:1. I work on a session by session basis and so there is no big package to sign up for. 1 session or 50, the choice is yours.

I do wish you all a great week.

With all kind wishes

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

Leave a comment

“We used to believe that we were thinking beings who just happen to feel. We now know that we are feeling beings who think.”
― Antonio Damasio

The self-esteem hub is all about the effects of how we perceive ourself, our sense of self-worth, our evaluation of our abilities, how we fit into the world and how we think others see us. We can experience this as a rollercoaster, functioning really well at times and then plagued with self-doubt an anxiety the next moment. This is the art and science of being human. I look forward to taking this journey with you.

Hello everyone,

My aim with this Monday article was to get it out every week at 8.30 am. To write it well in advance, be organised. And yes that worked for about 4.5 months of this year. Well now, its all gone to hell.

I put myself under a lot of pressure to stick to this rule (interesting as I have written about breaking rules quite a lot 🤣. I felt it was the thing to do. Everyone says if nothing else, be consistent on Substack. It is what proper writers do. Not that I really am a proper writer at all. I am a therapist that attempts to write about stuff you might find useful!

I was also bang on target with a Wednesday article every week. That has become totally non-existent in the last few weeks as you might or might not have noticed.

I have mentioned that I am moving house. Any house move is extremely stressful. This one is taking the total biscuit. The distance is making the complexity unreal. It is taking literally every moment of my day when I am not working. Working is like my time off now. I won’t get into the utter boring detail, but it is a lot, going on, right now.

I added to my personal pressure cooker by giving my self-critic an utter dream ticket with my difficulty getting Substack articles out. I felt bad, guilty and ashamed at my lack of ability to get my shit together to do it. Leading to a stream of self-abuse about it.

And then I thought, hang on a minute. The world is not going to stop spinning if this article goes out in the evening. In fact, I doubt anyone will notice. And I felt some steam escape and my stomach settled, and I felt peace. So now I sit here, happily writing, it is still Monday, this is still going out.

I hope the next time you feel total overwhelm, like I currently am, you might remember this slightly incoherent article and think, hang on, will the world stop spinning if I don’t do x or y or z? Can I give myself just a little break and let some pressure out of cooker and leave z, at least.

It is about giving ourselves permission to be fair to ourselves. We are only ever one person, who can only ever do our best at any given moment and can only do so much. That moment will always be different which effects out capacity. Trying to keep this perspective is really helping me right now. I hope it will help you at some point.

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I do wish you all a great week.

With all kind wishes

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

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"The greatest glory in living lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall." - Nelson Mandela

The self-esteem hub is all about learning how to get unstuck from unhelpful thoughts, overthinking and those loops of unhelpful behaviours we use to try and make ourselves feel emotionally safe. We know they make us feel worse and feed low self-esteem. Let’s tool up to understand and turn the volume down on anxiety.

Hello everyone.

A bit later today, forgot to put the timer on! oops!

You know how we get these feeds on our phone? I saw one this week from the Guardian about the most common mental health misinformation that has been found on TikTok. If you are interested you can read it here. Unfortunately whilst the paper is citing a study and “experts!”, it does not cite which study or which experts and so I can’t give my opinion on how legitimate it is.

This got me to thinking about why do we get sucked into this, often very misleading information.

And this is the topic of this article. How do we work out what is valid and what is not valid?

The way we operate as humans is complex. When you see a headline that scares you, “proves” a theory you have or is something that is currently of interest to you, it is going to lead you to read it. That is why, here on Substack, we spend a lot of time trying to come up with great headlines, to get noticed.

As a group of writers here, we would like to think we are critical in what we read. Critical in terms of how valid is it? But how often do you get led into reading articles outside of Substack that you assume is true.

Back in the day, of our early ancestors, the most information we would be subjected to was the local gossip of the tribe. We LOVE gossip! It is that curious nature that we need to fully engage when we critique the validity of what we read. And I am talking about non-fiction, of course.

How do we do that? Well, for me, a total red flag is something like that Guardian article. It does not cite who the ‘experts’ are so I can check out that they are experts. It cites a study but does give a source so I can check it out (at least that I could see).

Other things to consider:

1. Do the authors have any links to the thing they are writing about? For example, a vitamin company writing a blog about a the amazing benefits of their XXX vitamin? Some pretend its an independent blog! They are, of course going to be biased.

2. How many participants were in the study? If it was 12, we know it might have helped 12 people. I notice that a lot of cosmetic companies say they tried their product out on 10 women. Well, that is not very comprehensive is it? That doesn’t give us much of an idea, we need at least 100s.

3. It should also be a random selection of participants, not hand picked people that the idea or product will work for. Hand picked does not tell us anything about the rest of us.

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I would invite you to step back from the next thing you read and think about what they are telling you and not telling you! Love to hear what you notice.

I do wish you all a great week.

With all kind wishes

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

Leave a comment

“You do an awful lot of bad writing in order to do any good writing. Incredibly bad. I think it would be very interesting to make a collection of some of the worst writing by good writers.”
- William S. Burroughs

The self-esteem hum is all about learning how to get unstuck from unhelpful thoughts, overthinking and those loops of unhelpful behaviours we use to try and make ourselves feel safe. We know they make us feel worse and feed low self-esteem. Let’s tool up to understand and turn the volume down on anxiety.

Good morning everyone,

Some time ago I recorded a podcast about ‘toxic gratitude’. You can find it here:

I was just going to build on this a bit today. And to start of by saying yes it does matter, it really matters, the difference, that is.

Affirmations: if they work for you great. This article is for those who do them and think WTAF. I now feel so much worse. I am doing this wrong. I can’t do this. I am standing in front of the mirror saying “I am such a beautiful person” but I don’t bloody believe it. In fact, now I hate myself more. Look at that zit that came up over night. Oh mirror, “I hate the way I look today”. Feel familiar? Affirmations are made up things, that don’t have any root in reality. They make us feel like this is what we “should” be doing, thinking or feeling. It is usually far from our actual lived experience. They actually make us feel bad!

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Positive diary: can be as little as a small bullet point list, with a minimum of 5 things that we are happy about in our day. I say this to my clients as it makes it feel more manageable. Of course, it can be as many pages or paragraphs you like. It might become part of your journaling if you do that.

Now you are thinking, wtf is she talking about? It is a review of our day. Or can be done as we go through the day, before we sleep (that is a nice time to do this, going to sleep on things that make us happy) or whatever works. Writing with a pen will super power this. We process things 7x more when we write with a pen or pencil, so the science says!

It is an EVIDENCE BASED, REAL WORLD account of actual things things we feel happy about from our day. Things that happened to us or things we did for others that made our heart smile. Most of my clients say, hang on, I can’t find 5 things. Then we start to review their day so far and in 45 seconds we have way more than 5. Even if their appointment is at 9.30 am.

You are looking for things that made you heart smile, as I say. The barista who knew what your coffee is, a child running back to us to give us a kiss, someone smiling at us and saying good morning, us taking 5 minutes to chat to someone, even though we didn’t really have the time. Doing something for someone, anything, small or large. Taking 10 minutes to sit and drink a coffee we enjoy. Someone remembering something we were going to do and asking about it (being held in mind by someone else). Literally anything.

Why does this work? Humans tend to remember the difficult things. It is just the way we are. How many times have you thought of a whole day as terrible? If you were to really think about it, often it was probably a small portion of it? Or a response to one thing that went on for a long time. We tend to generalise (generalise=one cat scratched me so all cats will scratch me) things, and that can be really helpful a lot of the time. But not always. We can’t help it, it is that tricky brain of yours at work again. Looking for helpful things to write about at the end of the day (if that is when you choose to do it) helps to turn on the “positive” filter encouraging you to look around for the good things.

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When my clients do this they report a better day, feeling happier and looking at their days in different ways. Even if they feel like they really have to dig for it!

Don’t forget we are looking for the little things (and big things if they are there). What are your little things today so far?

Have at try, you won’t know unless you try?

I do wish you all a great week.

With all kind wishes

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

Leave a comment

“When you know you're ENOUGH!

When you stop focusing on all things that you're not.
When you stop fussing over perceived flaws.
When you remove all imposed and unbelievable expectations on yourself.
When you start celebrating yourself more.
When you focus on all that you are.
When you start believing that your perceived flaws are just that - perception...” ~ Malebo Sephodi

We all experience thoughts that cause us anxiety, from time to time, it’s part of being human. I think, part of the art of being human, is finding tools to manage the anxiety that these thoughts can produce. We may need different tools at different times. Each Monday, we will be tooling up!

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Good morning everyone,

Did you notice what thoughts came to your mind when you read the above quote? Can you jot them down?

I have terrible imposter syndrome! I am happy to share that. It comes and goes. When it is present it feels like an exhausting and upsetting battle with myself.

I think if you were to ask a lot of people around me they would not believe it. I am VERY good at hiding it.

Feel familiar?

When I read the quote, some of my thoughts were:

“I will never feel enough, what is even enough. Do I actually need to do more?”

“I need to focus on my flaws, keeps me safe, keeps others from noticing them, but I can also see in doing that, in itself, makes me anxious, I am therapist, why can’t I get myself out of this loop?” As a sidenote, the things that really trigger me here as a writer are spelling and grammar as I am dyslexic and sometimes don’t see errors. I have been picked up on such mistakes here.

As a writer, what are your particular triggers?

“I am aware I set myself ridiculous standards. I can let myself off the hook at times, but have all the excuses for not relaxing on other things”.

What were your thoughts? I am cringing even at reading that back!

Why have I used the word hypocrisy in the title? Part of Imposter Syndrome is putting success down to luck, other people’s support or other external influences, a sheer fluke, being in the right place at the right time or others over-estimating what you have done.

We experience this as intense anxiety, fear (of being found out!), crippling doubt that can stop many people here writing anything at all. We feel under threat and seek safety. Safety might look like avoidance, procrastination and, for some, being overly pushy, criticising others. There are many more.

The hypocrisy is about how wrong these thoughts are. We believe we are rubbish, but actually, the great things that we achieve are down to hard work, facing the fear and doing it anyway, keeping going even when feeling like we are writing to a void, persistence and many many more. This actually proves we are brave, resilient, strong, persistent, good at what we do and many many more.

Whilst we know on an intellectual level the good things we are, and how talented we are, we do not BELIEVE it. And therein lies the problem.

I will write more about making steps towards believing in ourselves later in the week.

See you then. For now, what has this article make you think about? This is a topic much written about, is there any different angle here? Anything that has landed with you? I would invite you to write that under the thoughts you wrote down at the start of this article and bring it back later in the week for more on this topic that effect writers, teachers, everyone!

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I do wish you all a great week.

With all kind wishes

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

Leave a comment

“What lies in our power to do, lies in our power not to do.” Aristotle.

We all experience thoughts that cause us anxiety, from time to time, it’s part of being human. I think, part of the art of being human, is finding tools to manage the anxiety that these thoughts can produce. We may need different tools at different times. Each Monday, we will be tooling up!

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Good morning everyone,

Another Monday has begun!

This week I am talking about humour. We all love to laugh and have a joke. However this is not what this is about this week. This is about the times when you come away from a conversation and feel hurt, misunderstood, bullied, ashamed, embarrassed………the list goes on.

And the perpetrator, walks away all puffed up feeling great about themselves and what they have done. Often leaving, along with the rest of the group agreeing and laughing at you too. So we can add feeling abandoned, left out, stupid….I am sure you know what I am talking about. Because when in a group setting, often the rest of the group will side with the perpetrator so they protect themselves from the same treatment.

Remind you of something? Yes, being back in High School! It is a form of bullying to my mind. A form of bullying that has been made socially acceptable by saying “I was only joking”. Four words, when used in that order, often infuriate me. Then comes the next part, one of my particular hates, “oh you have no sense of humour” or “lighten up” and such comments.

For the recipient it can feel like a bit of a “mind f***” as well. If the recipient feels hurt and everyone else is laughing at them, well, it is going to mess with your mind, isn’t it?

One of the most common forms of mean-spirited humour is sarcasm. On the surface, it may seem witty or clever, but it often conveys disdain or ridicule under a socially acceptable umbrella. People use sarcasm to undermine others, especially when they are uncomfortable expressing criticism directly. Similarly, "teasing" can become a way to highlight someone’s insecurities or differences under the guise of affection. While some teasing may be well-intentioned and mutual, it often crosses a line—especially when one person isn’t laughing.

I can think of countless times this happens to me, where I am the butt of the joke and I feel hurt with everyone else laughing in my face and criticising me for having no sense of humour. I never use humour to hurt. I will tell jokes, but they are not about the person in front of me or at my own expense.

This brings me to the next part of this. There is another way we can use humour that hurts us. When we make fun of ourselves to others. Self-deprecating humour can be disarming, relatable, and even charming. It’s often used to show humility, to connect with others, or to lighten a tense moment. But when someone constantly makes themselves the punchline, it can reveal something deeper and more painful beneath the surface. What may seem like innocent self-mockery is sometimes a way to express hidden shame, low self-worth, or to pre-empt criticism before anyone else has a chance to deliver it.

People who frequently joke about their appearance, intelligence, or failures often do so to protect themselves. They can think that if they say it first, it hurts less when someone else does. In my experience, it hurts even more when someone says “oh yeah, you are so fat you probably need two airline seats”. And then the group laugh. The person being laughed at is not going to feel better in any way, shape or form. I use this example as I actually witnessed this thoughtless, hurtful attack (I did address it). And it is an attack. It is bullying, not humour. All it does is reinforce the fears that person has about themselves. Amongst a whole lot of other harmful processes that I do not have room to write about here.

One of the other things that can happen from self-deprecating humour is that the others in the group do not recognise these statements people are making about themselves can come from a place of intense internal pain. If someone has cut their finger, you are not going to hit it with a hammer are you? Well in this situation, in effect, that is what is happening.

I have used this image of a child being bullied as we tend to identify, want to understand, want to protect when it is a child. However, remember, that the adult in front of you, may have been bullied from childhood as well and this type of use of humour is re-traumatising. Even if they have not been bullied in the past, an adult still feels everything you can see in this picture.

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I think many people have learned and think that this kind of bullying and is socially acceptable. And may not even realise what they are doing or think of it as bullying. Others may have different intent of course.

But as Aristotle says above, what lies in our power to do, lies in our power not to do.

I would love to hear what you think about this article. What is your opinion? Do you have a personal experience you feel ok to share?

I would also ask if you would consider sharing this article to get more people thinking? I think it is our responsibility as humans, to talk about difficult things, to become more aware and to grow.

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I do wish you all a great week.

With all kind wishes

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

Leave a comment

I come to this article today covered in paint as we have an estate agent (real estate over the pond) in tomorrow for a valuation. All those things you turn a blind eye to, yep, no longer, everything has to be white, white, white. Including me at this particular moment.

I work in the corporate world 3 days a week. I can’t say I particularly enjoy the environment. Advantages are working alongside some awesome therapists and with some inspiring clients. We have had a change of manager and it is too early to know what that is going to be like. Our previous manager was amazing and more like me. Probably kept me there for the last 3 years.

If we are going strict rules, this could be somewhat problematic for me. Getting in some extra Gin! I always look at rules as guidelines. I talked about this in my note today, in relation to Substack:

And from the note above, I seriously mean I will help support any writer struggling with heartless criticism from others.

My total dislike of many unnecessary rules has really been at the forefront of my mind this week. My last manager was very human. I had not realised how much she had protected us, as a team, from this particular corporate engine. With that protection gone, I can see the deep and dark workings of the place I work. It is not a shock, I am not idiot, but it is now there, right in front of me, glaring at me with dark foreboding eyes.

We need rules as a society. It is how human beings operate. But many rules are simply to have control. Fear of people having freedom and doing things that won’t benefit the people making the rules. Rules around how to build a safe building (hmmmm even then it can really extreme, judging from our recent house renovation when we ended up in a row with planning about wanting our cladding horizontal, they said it MUST be vertical. I won though) are sensible, rules about how to exit a building in a fire, ok, I buy into that. These sort of things are sensible. I could argue about having common sense, but it does not seem to be so common these days. But is that because we are so rule laden we don’t have enough space to think for ourselves? Let’s not get into that, today but happy to debate it in the comments!

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But a lot of rules are ridiculous, take the cladding mentioned above. It was even at the rear of our house where NO-ONE would see it! Many rules at work, are ridiculous. And when someone like me comes along and goes, hey, hang on a minute could we think about this differently, it is met with, well if you don’t follow that rule you will get a written warning. Or being told something like, well one person pushed that rule too far so now you are all locked down, as we now can't trust ANY of you now, lead to me becoming infuriated. They get away with it because we need our jobs to get paid and live.

So I am in the job market. I cannot tolerate what I see before me. I cannot see both myself and colleagues in what is literally slave labour for less than market pay, pay rises below inflation, very little leave and no room to breathe or think. Being back in the job market, moving 800 miles and having a new business (to enable me to leave the job market eventually) is a LOT at once, but heck, I can move through this period. Nothing is forever is it? Just one foot in front of the other at the moment.

When I have people working with me in my company, I will actually get a kick out of giving people room to grow, think, have an opinion, evolve, come up with ideas and take responsibility for how their role in the company works out. And….what I can learn from them.

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I would love to hear your experiences of managing rules around you, whatever domain they be.

Thank you, as ever, for reading. I can’t quite believe you are here.

With all kind wishes

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

Leave a comment

“Scars remind us where we have been, they don’t dictate where we are going” - This is a quote from a TV show, don’t judge me 🤣 It came to me when I was thinking about a good quote for this article.

We all experience thoughts that cause us anxiety, from time to time, it’s part of being human. I think, part of the art of being human, is finding tools to manage the anxiety that these thoughts can produce. We may need different tools at different times. Each Monday, we will be tooling up!

Subscribe now

Good morning everyone,

A little late today. I didn’t set up the timer correctly!

One of the common things I come across both personally and with my clients is the way we look back on what our younger self did.

How we reflect can empower or hold us back in the present moment.

For example, I did really badly at school. It wasn’t my fault, I was dyslexic and in that time that word was not one well known. I can remember sitting in the O level (GSCE these days) exam halls and not bothering to open the paper. I dropped out of school after that with only a pass in English as my English teacher had taken a special interest.

Scared of anything academic, following that, believing I was stupid as everyone kept telling me, I went and became a photographer as an apprentice. All practical in those days, no course needed. I then tried a psychology Open University Degree and I really struggled. For me it confirmed the idea I was stupid. But then, I got my courage together and applied to Kings College in London to do a Mental Health Nursing degree. They are the ones, later in my adult life, that identified my dyslexia. I left with a 2:1 and went back later to do my masters. I felt like the biggest imposter ever when I walked through Kings College London University doors as an under-graduate. Determination got me through it.

Being here on Substack and writing, has brought up old fears for me, for sure. It isn’t going to stop me though. I have worked with many writers and artists, over the years, who needlessly have ‘Imposter Syndrome’ because of their past (amongst other things, comparing is another).

We are all a product of our past experiences. For me it is about how can we use our past to help us now? Using, what I call the Life Journal we all have amassed over our lifetime. You can find out more about this idea here:

It is very easy to look back and think, OMG why did I do that. What we are doing in that second is twofold. First, we are beating our younger selves up. Second we are blaming our younger self for not acting differently based on the knowledge we have now, maybe a lot of years on.

For example, if we are now 46 years old. We look back at something our 25 year old self did, maybe something our current 46 self old self thinks is ‘stupid’. What do we do? We use our current knowledge base as a means to punish our 25 year old self for not knowing what we know now. At 25, we could not travel into the future and consult what do with our wiser current self, could we? We are being really unfair to our younger self.

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What I am saying in basic terms, is we make the best decision we can, based on the information we have at the time.

So next time you go to beat your younger self up, what could you do instead? Maybe offer some words of understanding? How would that make you current self feel?

If you found this article helpful, please do share it.

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With all kind wishes

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

Leave a comment

Am having writers block this week. Usually have so many topics in my head it can be hard to choose. But this week, nothing in there. Then I saw a reminder about mental health awareness week. So here is an opportunity seized, to talk about one of these pet hates I have!

As a therapist the title might look like I am unsupportive of mental health awareness! Of course, this is not true. I spend all my days helping with mental health.

I have looked up the dates for mental health awareness and am a bit confused as there are days (October) and a week and a month. But it doesn’t really matter!

Why is this a pet hate?

Because this picure below is what most people visualise when they see the words ‘mental health’ and then there is avoidance of this topic. The latest research from MIND suggests we are actually moving backwards with our attitudes towards mental health

Go to MIND to find out more

Photo by Ben Hershey on Unsplash

I do always feel the need to qualify what I am saying and referring to. So this article is not about the reality of the picture above, it is about the idea of having a mental health awareness day. Because what is depicted in this picture is a reality, sadly, for many. All my clients start off in distress. But this is not the mental health of many. We can all learn to improve how we manage our minds, but we all start from different places.

When you see something about mental health awareness week, what do you think? Is it, oh that is a good reminder, I am going to try and do something differently, or OMG not another one of these, then go back to worrying and total avoidance?

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Unfortunately, what I see, day to day, is that the term ‘mental health’ is viewed as a problem. A stigma, something to be feared. An illness or worse, a disease. It is associated with bad times, difficult times, suicide, depression, desperation, weakness, not being able to cope, being isolated, shunned (there is an old fashioned word!) or weak, just to mention a few. And all of that can be true, but it is not the whole story.

The experience of our minds (our mental health) is unique to everyone. What makes one person happy and feel safe is not what will make someone else feel safe. By safe I mean feeling ok, not worrying or anxious, that is when we don’t feel safe. Our ability to feel we can cope, manage our lives, have choices, can make choices, can make reasonable and proportionate risk assessments, have fun, feel emotions (all of them!) and be able to regulate them. We all have meltdowns at times, that is also part of being human, we get overwhelmed and then we recover. That is ok. The feeling we are a good person, confident in expressing our opinions, how we get on with others. Some of us prefer to be more solitary, others more socialable. There are no rights and wrongs. All these things and more, is our mental health (that feels grammatically incorrect, but you know what I mean).

How many times do others impose what makes them feel safe on us and then we don’t feel safe? If going to a party is someone’s best possible thing to do they can sometimes forget that forcing someone else to go is that person’s worst nightmare.

Mental health is not always what we assume. It is not good or bad, it is very very complex and constantly changing. We have tricky brains, it is not our fault, they are a product of evolution. But we can understand ourselves and others more. We can listen to what people are asking of us to improve their mental health. To note force them into that party and be kind about it.

What can you take from these ideas to improve your feeling of safeness or maybe help someone else feel psychologically safe?

My little dream is of a world where we treat people who broke their leg the same as if they experience anxiety. A world where we can hear a ‘no, I don’t want to do that’ and respect that, not impose our values on others, give unsolicited advice, be able to truly listen and a world where there is kindness, fairness and no judgement. That is a day I would like to see.

Photo by Jacqueline Munguía on Unsplash

With all kind wishes

Jane

Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

➡️If you would like to work with me on a 1:1 basis you can contact me at: mail@janewatkinscbt.co.uk

🛜 find me on my website, here

Subscribe now (it is all free at the moment) and join the movement towards healthy self-esteem development, something we can all benefit from, for ourselves and those around us.

Subscribe now