illness and personal change

How to cheer yourself up!

/ Laura Lee Carter / 2 Comments

Here it is 2020 World Mental Health Day in the midst of too many good reasons to feel bad. Mental health is one of the most neglected areas of public health. Close to 1 billion people are living with a mental disorder, 3 million people die every year from the harmful use of alcohol and one person dies every 40 seconds by suicide. And now, billions of people around the world have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, which is having a further impact on people’s mental health.

Five Warning Signs of Mental Illness

Long-lasting sadness or irritability.

Extremely high and low moods.

Excessive fear, worry, or anxiety.

Social withdrawal.

Dramatic changes in eating or sleeping habits.

Unfortunately, I have plenty of experience with these signs, but that also means I have experience in dealing with them successfully. After years of depression, five years of great counseling in my thirties, and a degree in counseling psychology, I have learned how to take better care of my own mental health. That is not to say I don’t have my down days, especially under the present circumstances!

Here are some ways I have learned to combat the blues:

Never underestimate the power of finding a GREAT therapist. I know it isn’t easy shopping for the best therapist for you when you feel bad, but trust your feelings in selecting the right person to help you over this difficult time in your life.

Mental health days have been important to me throughout my life. While in therapy and feeling deeply sad about understanding my past, my therapist encouraged me to take a day off now and then to be with my feelings. This was essential in helping me feel better. I was severely co-dependent at that time. I remember one day I said to my therapist I felt bad about feeling sorry for myself. She quickly responded with:

“At least you are feeling something for yourself!”

Then, when you start feeling better, start taking mental health days to celebrate feeling better! A few times I needed to call in and say: “I’m feeling too good to come to work today!” No not really, but that’s the way I felt… I remember one day I went out and bought myself some great new furniture. Now, every time I look at that dresser, I remember how great it made me feel to give myself a nice gift.

These days I have been trying a new affirmation out. Every morning when I wake up the first thing I see is my little sign across the room that says:

Today I’m going to love my life!

I find that when I focus on what I am grateful for, I truly have so many reasons to love my life. Consider the fact that we are alive in a great country at one of the BEST times in human history. At least you weren’t born in the 17th century, when “life was nasty, short and brutal.” Today many Americans have the opportunity to live long, pain-free lives. We have the benefits of medicine and science helping us to improve our lives and the lives of others. LUCKY US! We truly do have good reasons to love our lives, and if we don’t we are quite free to change them! This is what I learned from my own midlife crisis. Whatever you are not changing, you are choosing.

If none of this works, try chocolate. It works for me!

You’ve got to go crazy sometimes, or you might go crazy!

The history of human use of psychoactive plants: See “The Stoned Ages” and learn more!

/ Laura Lee Carter / Leave a comment

Have you ever thought you would like to learn more about the history of the use of psychoactive plants and botanicals in world history? I just saw a GREAT film about this on the History Channel this week!

Here’s few fun facts from this documentary:

From the beginning of the human race to the present, the human race has been using plants to feel better. From early man (& women), the Egyptians, and the Mayans (Pre-Columbian societies) there has been a constant search for medicinal plants. For example, the Mayans were quite familiar with plants in their environment. They regularly used tobacco in enemas, (bowel is blood rich) and ritual practices. Another example, their use of a solution with ayahuasca done in the presence of a Shaman. It’s purpose was to create a heightened perception of reality, creating a visionary state where one might commune with the gods. They believed these plant rituals gave them a unique gateway to the spiritual realm and the substances used were sacred tools to help them connect. They also used performance enhancing drugs in sports and many other pharmaceutical products.

The Ancient Greeks, especially the philosophers, used pharmaceuticals to create altered states, have out-of-body experiences and to journey to other worlds to meet their gods. Mushrooms and ergot (barley fungus) were used with no moral stigma, with the full realization that plants can heal and harm us. Drugs were about pleasure in the right circumstances and context, not about right and wrong. They felt, if the people were using plants to experience a union with God, what did they need with organized religion?

The Age of Religious Judgment: The Christians

After the Romans were converted to Christianity, their use of psychotropic substances became illegal. Early Christian history shows anxiety and suspicion when it came to pleasures of the body. According to them, faith in Christ is the only road to salvation, therefore an interest in alternative realities became a problem. The sense of puritanical self-denial was an important part of early Christian views. Denial of the pleasures of the body was essential in conversion to Christian spirituality, and this became the dominant value system in the West.

The Age of Discovery

Exploration of new worlds led to the discovery of new psychotropic substances, for example tobacco and cannibis. Since most drugs come from plants, international travel led to a confluence of drug products transferred to Europe in the early modern world. In addition, with the introduction of tobacco to the New World, came a new way to administer drugs, by smoking them… What did the term “patent medicines” mean in the 1800s in the USA? It meant they didn’t need to tell you what was in them. “Medicines” like morphine, cocaine, heroin, and aspirin.

Drink your Coca-Cola and you’ll feel so much better!

How has our society defined some psychoactive plants as “medicines” through the ages, and others as bad for you? Learn more by watching this documentary:

Today I’m Going To Love My Life!

/ Laura Lee Carter / 1 Comment

I’ve been overwhelmed lately with the idiocy we call American politics. We all go somewhere different to get our “news” and then we spout whatever misinformation we hear wherever. It sounds to me like we have too much free time and too many sources of information and misinformation, and the Internet is responsible for most of this. On top of that we have the worst wildfires in American history and hurricanes coming on shore like never before.

What I hate to see is all of the hatefulness that Trump has succeeded in spreading throughout our country, one that in fact we all love and want to be better. Most of us just want a better country with less death and destruction. Can we all agree on that at least?

To combat this anxiety and hatefulness I am pulling way back from watching the news. In addition, I have been trying a new affirmation out. Every morning when I wake up the first thing I see is my little sign across the room that says:

Today I’m going to love my life!

I find that when I focus this way, I truly have so many reasons to love my life. Politics do not need to consume us. Consider the fact that you are alive in a wonderful country at a glorious time in history. One of my favorite quotes from the 17th century was that “life was nasty, short and brutal.”

Today many Americans have the opportunity to live long, happy and healthy lives. Sure some of us cannot breathe without the assistance of supplementary O2 (like me!) but at least we can access those resources. We have the benefits of science helping us to improve our lives and the lives of others. LUCKY US!

I don’t know about you, but when I look around me, I find so many reasons to love my life. I feel so much gratitude for it all! I feel I have had the proper circumstances to get a good education and then make the kind of choices that have made my life great. Self-improvement has been so important to me, as well as learning that blaming and shaming others for my own faults is toxic. Self -responsibility has been key for me to create the kind of life I can love.

To tell the truth, I never would have imagined that I would end up here in this safe and beautiful (but smoky today!) place with a life I can love.

I can only wish you all the same success.

Alternatives to becoming a prisoner of media-created stress & anxiety…

/ Laura Lee Carter / 2 Comments

It struck me the other day, as I was enjoying 20/20 vision for the first time in my entire life (get some cataract surgery!), and feeling particularly relaxed and happy, that most of us don’t realize that we do make perhaps unconscious choices everyday. Do you choose to feel constantly worked up about Covid-19, that crazy guy at the top, upcoming elections, etc.? Would you like to seek more positive distractions?

Think about it this way, most of us have it better than just about everyone else in the world today, AND better than most in human history! I thought, “Do we need to constantly find more to worry about? We’ll all be dead soon, so lighten up!

That same day I received a review copy of a book I can highly recommend to those of you who would like suggestions on how to turn your attention to spiritual things that create space for you to pause and reflect, nourish your mind, and make useful tools to assist you in your personal development journey. The Mind Remedy: Discover and Use Simple Objects to Nourish Your Soul by UK psychologist Ruth Williams allows us to explore our thoughts, ideas, emotions, and memories through objects that are touching, thought-provoking and soul-stretching. From dream catchers to worry beads, this beautifully crafted book shares the origins, meaning and practice of creating 20 different enlightenment tools to increase feelings of well-being. These tools are divided into different headings like “Finding Connection”, “Inner Peace”, “Self-Discovery” and “Finding Your Roots.”

For example, here is a sample of the page on creating your own worry beads. Sometimes we need something tactile to sooth us…

“Simple things really can nourish the mind. When we anchor the unseen processes of the mind to something that we can hold in our hands, then the intangible becomes real. Healing feels within reach because we can touch the object that will carry us there…”

Check out this simple, beautiful book if you are looking for alternatives to worry, stress & anxiety.

Stevie helps me see the world with new eyes!

/ Laura Lee Carter / 2 Comments

I’ve been taking some time off from this blog and many of my usual activities since my cataract surgery on August 4th. The other eye comes soon! Dealing with new eyes, anemia, an apparent allergy to taking iron and other allergies has me distracted. When it rains it pours!

But stepping back for a while is important for all of us. That’s why I enjoyed the fact that a few of you found your way to my August 2016 piece about allowing your mind to lie fallow. To quote that piece:

“Spacing out” is the best way I can think of to describe those times when my mind is simply exhausted and cannot focus on one more thing.

Allowing your mind to lie fallow brings up all sorts of useful and interesting thoughts! Yesterday, I found myself indulging in a long and lively listening session to some of my favorite Stevie Wonder songs. There are a few from his “Inner Visions” album that take me immediately and directly back to my freshman year in college at Colorado College. What an exciting time that was for me, discovering new things everyday about myself and the world around me! A different set of his songs take me back to that summer in 2004 when I started my own dating service. I had such a fun time hanging out with others who, like me, were searching for love in midlife.

With the choice of Kamala Harris (YES!) & our national focus on racism recently, the question suddenly appeared in my mind:

What would our country be like today if we had never experienced any African influence from the beginning? How do you spell boring? You must admit our country is wonderfully diverse, and that’s a good thing! Such an exciting mix of colors and very different cultures. That’s what I love about it!

Stevie’s Inner Visions Album

Go listen to a few of my favorite songs and then try to disagree….

Visions

Don’t you worry ’bout a thing

Golden Lady

As

And one of my personal favorites, especially after leaving city life behind:

Living just enough for the city

Choose those who make your life BETTER!

/ Laura Lee Carter / 3 Comments

This may seem like a no-brainer, but as I think back to so many of my early relationships I see how I did exactly the opposite. I swear I was looking for trouble in my past relationships, instead of a better life for myself. I was looking for someone to help. It wasn’t really conscious, but it was there. Somewhere inside I thought my only worth was in helping others. No one could possibly love me just for being me. I wasn’t worth that much.

Looking back I truly suffered in my early relationships, but I thought that was what being with others was all about. Where did I get this gigantic piece of misinformation? Why wouldn’t I choose to be with others who loved and wanted the best for me?

As crazy as this was, co-dependency works this way. And until I learned so much more about my emotional problems in counseling, I continued to torture myself with the same old assholes, even into my first marriage.

I guess I finally got tired of all the drama and sadness. I chose differently at age 49. I was not sure when I first met Mike. Was I making the same past mistakes? It took a year or so to know for sure. But I know now that I live within a relationship where my partner does everything he possibly can to make me a happier and healthier person. I have finally found my soft place to fall.

How to Believe in Love Again: Opening to Forgiveness, Trust and Your Own Inner Wisdom, by Laura Lee Carter, M.A. Transpersonal Counseling Psychology, Naropa University.

how-to-believe-in-love-again-between-tiny-and-blog-size

Most of us start out believing that love can transform our lonely lives into something better. When that doesn’t work out as hoped for or planned, do we dare dream again? After 25 years, I lost my job back in 2004.  At age 49, divorced with no kids, no job and no career, I began to totally focus on “What’s next?” The rational, practical side of my brain told me to go get another crappy job, but my inner wisdom begged to differ.  It kept prodding me to open my own non-Internet-based matchmaking service. Eventually I agreed. I figured, what did I have to lose? I needed a date and a job.

Little did I know that this new business would unconsciously nudge me towards an even more profound use of my intuition and inner wisdom, guiding me towards a new life and new LOVE!