quick note: this blog post is not written by AI. The writing below features ideas and wisdom of artists, personal journalling and newsletter writing, curated to what a therapist feels the world is needing these days. 

Image via @realizationbypea

from our newsletter, written by Linda Lin, RCC, RCAT

Be real with me… what is your relationship with time like?  ୧ ‧ ˚ 

When I am overwhelmed, time feels like the scariest, most unattainable currency that I cannot get back once it pasts by. From the hours, minutes to seconds, I find myself reacting to my thoughts, the ‘standards’ and shoulds on how I need to be spending my time and transforming it into something valuable, productive, ~rich~.

This obsession leaks into how I see money, work, relationships and I'd hate to admit this, my entire sense of self.

I’ve met so many people who try to force outcomes to ‘shape their reality.’ That might look like getting a perfect job with no career gaps or trying to appear as though they have their life together by a certain age (we're not even on linkedin btw •̀ ᴖ •́). Over time, those expectations can attach themselves to our identity and perceived reality.

via pinterest

The more we obsess over time, the more it breeds fear, frustration, hesitation and misalignment.

Did you know? 
Your energy is your most VALUABLE resource in life.

Therefore where you put your time and attention determines everything.

Instead of forcing outcomes, what if we start curating your reality with alignment, creative direction, and thoughtful refinement. Like an artist curating their work 𖦹

via pinterest

I journaled this the other day: “my relationship with time is kind, sweet, caring, full of life, light”

Perhaps mourning/stressing about time and next thing, which is heavy in weight, is dictating a relationship with time that isn’t valuable to me!

We cannot time hop in multiple streams of consciousness. 

So disappointing, am I right? It's really too bad that we can’t live in every parallel timeline like we are everything everywhere all at once. Trying to juggle all the goals, tasks, and “what ifs,” whether it’s making our days off perfect or savouring the end of summer, usually just leaves us with an abstract and confused state of feeling.

HOWEVER, I’ve been thinking a lot about quantum leaping, also called timeline jumping. The idea is that if you’re on level 1 and you want to get to level 8, it’s really about giving yourself room to believe that level 8 is just the next step, waiting for you.

Time is not something we need to centre and obsess over.

Thanks to this tiktok I watched last month, I've been on this case ever since. Obsessing about time traps us in procrastination, locks us into overwhelm, and confines us to cycles of productivity and capitalist urgency which are the very things we don’t want taking over our lives.

When our most easeful and fluid path (the realm where time flow exists) starts to blur under pressure, how can we anchor ourselves to remember how we want time and life to truly feel?

Here’s your art journalling prompt:

Draw and describe how fluid time is to you currently. Draw a portal that allows you to experience time the way you want time to feel.
 

Use your fave mediums: Mine are stickers, collaging, digital media like Pinterest images, sparkly gel pens, words, pencil crayons, oil pastels, coloured pens to express myself.

From this prompt, TIME IS A MEADOW came up for me. I call her, Mother Time. Instead of me trying to micro-manage/control time, or duelling it out with time, she is here to support me. This isn't a battle. I also don't have to mother time. Time is here for me and with me. I'm rolling with it and curious to what this art prompt will reveal for you!

TLDR; or don't feel like journalling? Try reflecting on this in the month ahead:

✩ Gently build curiosity by learning your unique rhythm and pace.

✩ Practice your ability to redirect and focus with purpose and intention. 

✩ Slowly expand your capacity for flow instead of control with time.

I see you! ⋆˙⟡ written by yours truly, Linda

from our newsletter, written by Linda Lin, RCC, CCC, RCAT

Instead of accepting the status quo, the intergenerational trauma and oppression that society normalizes, you are more interested in what we need to change, and ways to break the cycle.

You have probably been developing and fine-tuning your critical awareness.

When we find ourselves questioning everything around us and don’t take anything at face value, we begin to see where change is needed.

“Knowing who I am informs what I want to change.”

When we embrace our identities and declare our positionality, it adds depth, richness and meaning to everything we do.
 

Knowing yourself is arguably the first step it took for me to build critical awareness.

So what is critical awareness/consciousness?

As we are navigating in this dystopian world, our levels of consciousness can shift in and out as responses to overwhelm. Paul Freire's (1973) work outlined 3 levels of consciousness: 

Here's a hot take…

I am convinced that we have all been in magical consciousness at some point or another!

Whether it's about climate change, racism, ableism, stigma or divisiveness around gender orientations, social classes, types of education… we live under multiply oppressive systems and I am pretty sure we experience these 3 levels of consciousness all the time.

You probably have a loved one, or friend group or acquaintances who do not perceive our actions as capable of changing conditions… and, I want to remind you that hope isn’t an emotion or optimism, hope is a discipline (as quoted by Mariame Kaba).

If you are dreaming of better and brighter futures for yourself and us all on a certain area, what informs you of this hope for liberation?

Why would this be showing up for you so strongly?

・₊✧

Perhaps there is a soul wound…

Soul wound: 

the psycho-spiritual damage peoples suffer from historical trauma, intergenerational trauma and colonization. Another interpretation I found of the 'soul wound' is the moral injury that pierces a person's identity, sense of morality, and relationship to society.

Here are some ways to sustain our soul:
 

Soul care is caring for each other. When the soul or culture of certain groups are oppressed, we need to find each other who are radicalizing from the wounding so we can liberate from such oppression in small communities at a time.

Tending to our bodyminds. For example, healthy ways to release rage if you have been feeling this could be to seek community, bring in movement and singing (activates our vagus nerve), or join creative workshops. Choosing to support our bodyminds are small and mighty ways to live authentically, so we have room to take care of each other.

Community and belonging. We navigate repression effectively in community. Hope in our ability to get through hardships together makes us resilient and powerful. As Decipher is approaching year 4 as a therapy practice, I have been brainstorming ways to foster more third space elements: spaces outside of work and home that bring a sense of belonging, collaboration and community.

Committing to lifelong learning. It is incredibly humbling when critical consciousness builds within us: when it continues to witness, call out, and awaken parts of us that have been laying dormant due to internalized -isms from living in an oppressive world.

If you are needing to play, rest and fuel your creative spirit to continue showing up for collective liberation, I am collaborating with my friend, Monica from Level V Bakery to bring you 4 workshops this Summer! Save your spot in the link below and share with your friends 🫶

from our newsletter, written by Linda Lin, RCC, CCC, RCAT

Have you ever heard of the saying, 'work to live’, instead of ‘live to work’ and wondered… how the heck do I do that?

…Perhaps there's something gnawing inside of you when you hear that you have a choice to “live” fully/presently.

…Perhaps you are seeking for self-actualization or a spiritual awakening of some sort, to transform and do some healing.

…Perhaps you are similar to myself, in which they call a ‘cyclebreaker’.

…Then maybe you're in the right place 💗

In these past few years, I found myself exploring rest as resistance and strategizing ways to escape capitalism (which is a system that uses humans as commodities) with the intention of living wholly as a liberation practice.

I sense in my body, that when I verbalize these words above, it's still fresh. Kind of like discovering a treasure chest that’s been locked up under the sea for a very long time.

Sometimes I wonder if an ancestor from my lineage has called out unjust systems before and the wisdom got lost along the way.

Or if they were punished for questioning it.

Or that no one has ever cared to be critical of it until little old me.

In this journey, I am discovering just how deep intergenerational wounds can be, especially when it comes to my relationship with work for survival…

 ₊˚ ☁️・₊✧ 

Healing justice is when we reflect, observe and recognize how systems we seek to change outside of our bodies are also carried within our bodies.

To feel worthy of rest is not easy for me and my lineage!

In fact, it's an arduous feat for someone like me to find exits out of stifling spaces and experiences. I find myself crisis managing, keeping up with thoughts of what is expected of me in moments when I need to listen to myself and need rest the most.

(Below is me rambling so you can choose to skip past this)

I heard stories that each of my parents took on multiple jobs to save up for a one-way ticket to come from their motherland to a new continent, leaving the rest of their families physically behind and sending back the fruits of their labor to support them financially. Growing up, it was normalized to not take weekends off. With barely any time for relational building and quality time, this never-ending hamster wheel has played like a broken record.

(Okay, I would LOVE for you to read this ↓)

Breaking the cycle means unwinding intergenerational wounds of up to 14 generations!

Please note that it is NOT about breaking the entire 14 generations of burdens, and that if you still struggle with the cycle showing up, you are no longer a cycle breaker. The focus is more about building awareness of personal responses, of family's history and ancestors' stories, as well as cultural woundings. Being a cycle breaker is about building critical consciousness (will write more about this in the next newsletter) of what is the wound that your lineage and yourself have been carrying. 

In the therapy room, I have been practicing remembering that when clients/folks are in session with me, I may be witnessing up to 500 years of ancestral wisdom, cultural and historical stuff showing up.

Hey, I recognize that this practice sounds intimidating. However, it serves as a reminder that we are incredible humans who can carry some pretty heavy stuff.

We are on this journey of liberating ourselves, future generations and organizing with community for a better world. That’s some superhero typa power 💪

・₊✧  Take a deep breath here   ☁️・₊

Some gentle reminders I tell myself:

"I will notice more presence, tend to my body and mind, and feel my heart space soften.

There will be many more moments where I catch myself in labor when I could have chosen to relax. That is because these systems are designed for me to sense risk if I were to choose to rest (ahem… due to capitalism, patriarchy, intergenerational wounds… ahem).

There will be many more moments where choices to rest will become closer within reach. When I am no longer defined by the disconnection, violence, betrayal and disregard of my healing."

꩜   𖦹   ꩜   𖦹   ꩜

Here's a journalling/art prompt for you, or a conversation you may choose to have with your community:

What is it that you are hoping to break in this lifetime?

-Linda

from our newsletter, written by Linda Lin, RCC, CCC, RCAT

Forcibly unwinding from overwhelm and trying to restore our bodies with a set time period during the holiday season is not easy. Coming back into the new year, I sense that so many of us are intentionally trying to find ways to slow down and are realizing that we aren’t the best at it.

Behind the front of busyness

You don’t get the point of rest yet. You may only know how to bounce back after hitting burnout, dealing with illness, or facing challenges.

But rest... what’s that again?

Symptoms of not knowing how to truly rest:

• irritability

• sensitivity around time

• indecisiveness

• permanence anxiety: “this is what it will always be” “I’m always going to be behind in life”

• internalized oppression and shame
  

You might not have noticed but...you are in survival mode.

Note the survival math:

• Pressure to achieve x y z by the end of the day or else the day will be wasted or ruined.

• The need to make sure activities for rest/enjoyment will work out and have benefits → “If I were to make art, it will only be worth it if I feel calmer.”

• Free time spent on others = acceptable
Free time spent on myself = time wasted

I don’t know who needs to hear this but...

You do NOT have to be a continuous improvement project for the new year.

Rest is NOT something that is earned or deserved!

DIS-EASE is a disease.

Two questions I have for you to reflect on are:

What are you preoccupied by when you are engaging in ‘busyness’?

Is this where your pain resides? Or is your pain located/hiding somewhere else?