Free Therapy

This is a compilation of things I’ve heard from therapists that helped me. I hope it helps you too.

1) “Don’t have important conversations while you’re feeling overwhelmed, numb, or explosively angry. Progress can only be made when you’re calm.”

2) “Narcissists can only see themselves. So most likely whatever they’ve said about you is a projection of what they fear about themselves. You are not the problem,they are wrong.”

3) “The first step of letting go of your pain is realizing that you’ve made it part of your identity.”

4) “There are thoughts that are not true, and you don’t have to entertain them. There are also thoughts that are true but not useful and you don’t have to entertain those either”

5) “When in confrontation use this diagram

When you (do thing) I feel (thing).

Ie: When you yell at me, I feel like you’re about to hit me.

It’s far less accusatory, and sounds much more honest. “

6) “If you need reassurance in a relationship, just ask for it. It will save both of you a lot of time and stress.”

7) “Don’t hold people to invisible contracts.”Let me give you an example. I had a friend that always wanted my advice (which made me feel useful) and in return I expected him to take my advice. He never did and it made me incredibly angry because he was breaking the contract…that he didn’t know existed. You see the issue with that?

8) “When you love someone with childhood trauma, there will be times that you’ll realize that the emotional reaction that they’re having towards you isn’t about you, it’s about things that happened in the past. So what do you do? We’ll you have two options:

You can tell them that. Tell them that it isn’t about you and that it’s just from crap in the past. Stomp on them emotionally.

Or you can take responsibility for your part, and lower your intensity. And you’ll notice as the intensity lowers, so does the projection.”

9) “If your partner is bringing up things that happened weeks ago, a year ago, 5 years ago, it’s because whatever happened hasn’t healed yet.”

10) “When something is horrific enough, it shuts off the decision making and reason parts of our brain (hippocampus and thalamus), then the nervous system shuts down in a fight or flight reaction known as “freeze”. None of what I just mentioned was a conscious decision. You did what your nervous system allowed.”

11) “Don’t beat yourself up for not knowing what you hadn’t learned yet”

12) “You are not responsible for the version of you that they created in their mind.”

13) “You can’t expect rational actions and reactions from irrational people”

14)”People don't have to understand your boundaries for you to be allowed to enforce them. You're not obligated to explain it if you don't want to. You can just set your boundary and keep it regardless of how others feel about it.” And relating to that, there is no room for compromise when it comes to boundaries.”

15) “Toxic is toxic. Title doesn’t matter”

16) “Every emotion, chemically-speaking, lasts 90 seconds. If you keep engaging, the emotion will continue to "fire" and reset this. If you distract yourself, you can deactivate the initial reaction.”

17) “Judgement from another person only hurts if it’s a judgement you are already holding against yourself.”

18) “How people behave says everything about them and nothing about you”

19) “Your panic attack symptoms are not dangerous, it's an overload of adrenaline trying to burn itself out, the feeling is temporary and you're not dying, won't faint/be sick or have a heart attack. Disacociating is your mind just trying to tell you it's exhausted. Despite how it feels, it’s not dangerous.”

20) “If you're kind to others, you're capable of being kind to yourself. Take care of yourself like you would for a friend.”

Let me know if this helps you in the comments down below! I’ll be writing a part two soon. :)