argument Archives - Amazing Health Advances

How to Reset and Reconnect After a Fight or Argument

AHA Publisher — Thu, 16 Dec 2021 08:00:39 +0000

Dr. Caroline Leaf – In this podcast (episode #341) and blog, I talk about ways to reset and reconnect after a fight or argument. Arguing with friends, family members or loved ones is inevitable. It’s impossible for us to get along all the time, especially when we spend a lot of time with certain people, such as during the holiday season. We are all unique, and we all see the world in different ways. This is a wonderful thing. It makes the world interesting—it makes living in this world a wonderful learning experience. However, it can also lead to a lot of misunderstandings, miscommunications, and conflicting opinions! It is important that even when these arguments or misunderstandings come up, we find ways to make amends—to bridge the divide as best we can. Yes, this can be a challenge, and it can take some time, but it is possible. Here are some simple tips you can follow to reconnect with a loved one, colleague, or friend after a fight: • See arguments as a natural part of life. The first thing to remember after a fight, especially when you feel sad, angry, or frustrated, is that arguments between friends, family, and loved ones are normal. • Recognize that arguments can be beneficial. In many cases, these arguments allow for healthy emotional expression and can help prevent the buildup of resentment or grudges. It can also help you better understand the other person and help them understand you. Arguments may even lead to better boundary setting because both you and the other person communicate what you can and can’t deal with. Arguments can also lead to compromise, an essential part of any relationship. A reasonable amount of arguing is actually quite ordinary and can be healthy because it is in the messiness we can repair and grow. No “mess” means there is nothing to repair or change, which means no growth. It’s how you argue that is key! • Give yourself time to calm down. Most likely, the fight involved many emotions, as well as some accusations and defense mechanisms. Even if you managed to get the root issue resolved, your cortisol levels are probably still quite high. This is why it may be a good idea to take a break and distance yourself from the other person for a little bit—see this as gathering and processing time. Work on calming yourself down; go for a walk, do some deep breathing, practice yoga, or whatever works for you. • Make sure you address the issue(s) that come up. Once you have managed to calm down, it is always a good thing to readdress some of the issues or problems that led to the argument. This doesn’t have to happen on the same day—you may even need a few days to process what happened or calm down. There is no set way or time to do this, but re-addressing the issues can lead to healthy conversations, compromises or boundaries that could prevent further arguments in the future. I know that doing a “review” of sorts may seem stressful or repetitive, and you may feel like you just want it to go away and move on, but this can be beneficial. Think about how, with certain people, you tend to have the same fight over and over again. When you “redress and assess” the fight, you can really get to the core of why you disagreeand possibly prevent it from happening again. This is particularly important if you could not resolve the issue in the heat of the moment. • Apologize. Sorry is a powerful word. It acknowledges the other person’s pain, anger, sadness or frustration, and indicates that you don’t want them to feel that way. This can be very tough to do because our pride often gets in the way, but it can also be incredibly freeing, especially if followed by action so the apology doesn’t seem like an empty gesture. • Laugh. One great way to reconnect after a fight is to tell a little joke or bring up a funny topic or memory that you both have in common. When you laugh with someone, you are literally resetting your brain and reestablishing the connection that you have. • Get to the root of the issue(s). Make sure you get to the root of why you had the fight, or it may happen again in the future. One way I recommend doing this is using mind management to do a mental “autopsy” on why you both reacted in the way you did. To this end, I recommend doing a Neurocycle—the 5-step mind-management system I have developed over the past 38 years that is based on my research and practice. (I discuss this in detail in my book Cleaning Up Your Mental Mess, my app Neurocycle and in my recent clinical trials.) The 5 steps are: 1. Gather Awareness of how you feel about the argument emotionally and physically. What are your warning signals? Frustration? Depression? Anxiety? Irritability?Does your brain feel tired even though your mind doesn’t want to stop? Are you battling with gut and intestinal issues like bloating? Are you experiencing bursts of aggression? Are you more irritable than normal? 2. Reflect on why you feel the way you do. Go through each of these warning signals and ask yourself “Why?” Dig deep and be honest with yourself. Ask yourself questions like “Why am I frustrated? I’m frustrated because…” 3. Write this all down to help organize your thinking and get more insight into what is going on in your life. 4. Recheck what you have written and reflected on. Take each of the warning signals you have gathered, reflected on, and written down above, and see them for what they are: signals that something is going on in your relationship that needs to be addressed. Then, work out a relationship“antidote” (new thought pattern/behavior) for each one. 5. Active reach. Take action to work on the issue you are dealing with in your relationship. But, remember to give yourself and the other person grace! Rome wasn’t built in a day, and it will take time to develop this newly reconceptualized way of responding, so keep on keeping on. To read the original article click here.

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How to Become a Responder Not a Reactor + How Arguments Affect Your DNA

AHA Publisher — Tue, 04 May 2021 07:00:36 +0000

Dr. Caroline Leaf – Think of the last time you had an argument and how it made you feel, both physically and mentally. Pretty bad, right? Well, it is not all just in your head! Unresolved arguments can be harmful to your health, and can potentially decrease your longevity! In this podcast (episode #274), I talk about the importance of resolving arguments, and the incredibly beneficial impact this can have on your wellbeing and quality of life. A recent study from Oregon State University found that when people have resolved an argument, “the emotional response associated with the disagreement is significantly reduced”, while, “in some situations, it can be entirely erased”. Why is this important? Essentially, when you work to resolve an argument, you not only improve your relationships, but also your emotional health, which, in turn, can improve your overall wellbeing. There is much research, including mine (for more on this see my latest book, Cleaning Up Your Mental Mess), showing how unmanaged minds can result in toxic stress levels that affect our mental and physical health. This makes sense with major stressors like poverty or violence, but research has shown that daily chronic stressors like minor inconveniences and unresolved arguments can also have a lasting impact on our health and mortality. When it comes to arguments, avoidance and lack of closure can increase anxiety levels, which can impact our overall health (due to the mind-body-brain connection I discuss in detail in Cleaning Up Your Mental Mess). The Oregon studymentioned above notes that this includes “avoiding an argument to ‘keep the peace’” and/or “having an argument but not resolving it”. In this study, this avoidance resulted in increased reactivity, which lead to an increase in the subjects’ negative emotions, as well as an amplified emotional “residue”, that is a prolonged negative emotional toll the day after the negative experience occurred, all of which impacted the subjects’ health and mental wellbeing. However, in that same study, if an argument was resolved, “people reported half the reactivity on the day and no residue the day after”, which resulted in better health outcomes. What does all this mean? While people cannot always control what stressors come into their lives, and while the lack of control is itself a stressor in many cases, they can work on their own emotional response to those stressors. As I always say, we cannot always control our circumstances, but we can control our reactions to our circumstances. This is mind-management in action, and leads to a host of positive health outcomes, including better ageing and better stress resilience. In fact, through mind management and self-regulation, you can learn to manage your stressors in a way that they do not have a gnawing impact on you over the course of the day, which will help minimize the potential long-term impact of negative emotions on your health. I recommend doing a Neurocycle, which is a way to harness your thinking power through mind-management that I have developed and researched over the past three decades (I discuss this in detail in my book Cleaning Up Your Mental Mess), to identify where you are at in your relationships and help resolve an argument. This process has 5 steps: First, take a break, go into another room or space and calm the brain down by breathing deeply. I recommend breathing in for 5 counts and out for 11 counts, and repeating this technique 3 times (for around 45 seconds). Next, GATHER awareness of your emotional and physical warning signals, such as tension in your shoulders, indigestion or feelings of anxiety. How has this argument made you feel emotionally and physically? Then, REFLECT on why you are having these feelings. Ask, answer and discuss with yourself what was said or done that resulted in the argument, and how it has made you feel. What do you think these feelings are telling you about the argument and about your response to the argument? What happened? What was said? Why? What assumptions may you be making? Why do you think the other person reacted the way they did? After this step, WRITE down what you reflected on. This will help you organize your thinking. Then, RECHECK. Look for triggers, thought patterns and “antidotes” (that is how you would like to respond in the future and how you would like the situation to end). Lastly, practice your ACTIVE REACH. Practice using the “antidote” you came up with in the recheck step to deal with your trigger. For example, this could be as simple as practicing not raising your voice or being more aware of your body language. To read the original article click here. For more articles from Dr. Leaf click here.

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The Mental Health Benefits of a Good Argument + Dispelling Common Myths That Could be Sabotaging Your Relationships

AHA Publisher — Wed, 21 Oct 2020 07:00:41 +0000

Dr Caroline Leaf – Relationships can be tough, especially during a global pandemic. Many of us are spending more time than ever before with our partner, while COVID-19 has made it harder to connect with others if we are single and looking for a relationship. Thankfully, whether we are single, in a relationship, or somewhere in between, there are things we can do now to attract the kind of love we want in our lives, as I discuss in my recent podcast interview (episode #211) with bestselling author, speaker and couples counselor Monica Berg. We talk about everything you need to know about healthy relationships, including why we need to rethink love, the mental health benefits of a good argument, how to attract the kind of love you want, rekindling love in your life, building frameworks for lasting and fulfilling relationships, tips for single people, and how to become more comfortable with change. As Monica notes in her new book, Rethink Love, in our culture we overemphasize romanticized versions of love. We tend to end our stories where love actually begins: walking into the sunset and living happily ever after. At the core of the strongest and most sustainable relationships is the most important relationship you will ever have: the one you have with yourself. For any relationship to be successful, you must become authentic and vulnerable as a person: you need to become your own best friend. The good news is that it’s never too late to do this! The state of your life and your relationships is dependent on you. If you are single or in a relationship, the best thing you can do right now is to stop and take a good look at the state of your relationships or where you are in life and be honest with yourself. Open your mind and give yourself permission to access the innermost parts of your life. Just be honest with yourself — don’t pressure yourself to do anything just yet. When we acknowledge where we are in life, we begin the healing process. It is never too late to restart and change, and this starts with acknowledging what needs to be changed! Remember, life happens to you, not through you. You are never going to be happy all the time—you are a human being going through human experiences. However, this does not mean you cannot learn to embrace all possibilities to change, even hard ones. You can wake up excited every day for these opportunities, both known and unknown, to grow and reach a new level of elevation; this is our ultimate joy as human beings. If you adopt this mentality, you can live a happy and fulfilled life and have great and lasting relationships, no matter what life throws your way. True relationship success starts with you. In Rethink Love, Monica notes how being honest with yourself and doing the work needed to become your own best friend will really transform your life and relationships. Why? Relationships fail when we: Do not do our own internal work. Far too often, we look externally for things that will fulfill us internally. We look to people to make us love ourselves, but no one person can do that for us. Do not understand the difference between seeking validation and getting feedback. Validation is when we look to someone else to make us feel okay. Feedback, on the other hand, helps makes us better by helping us work through our issues. Think that we do not deserve love. We can’t hold two opposing thoughts at the same time. We can’t say we want to be respected and loved unconditionally and feel that we don’t deserve love or respect. If you are single, the most important thing you can do right now is build your internal foundation. The relationship with you have with yourself is most important part of any relationship you will have, so do the uncomfortable internal work first. When you do this, your energy will attract the kind of love you want. If you search for someone when you are broken, you are probably going to find someone who is a little broken as well. We also need to rethink what love means in our relationships. The most important thing we can do is know the difference between unconditional love and ego-based love. Don’t go into a relationship with a consumer mindset. The other person is not just there to make you happy. It is far more important to ask what you are offering in the relationship. You want to become an appreciator, not a depreciator. You should love someone because they exist, not just because they give you something you want. This means thinking about what that person feels, what their needs are, how you can put yourself in their shoes and put their needs first. Remember, your partner wants the same thing you want: to be heard and seen. We also need understand the importance of fighting well in a relationship. If you don’t argue in a relationship, then you should be concerned. This means you don’t care enough to fight about something! However, you should not just argue or fight without thinking. Every couple needs to find their own fighting style, or what Monica calls “spiritual sparing”. This means: Understanding how your past affects the way you argue in the present. Do you fight like your parents fought? How does your partner respond to your fighting style, and vice versa? Knowing the physiological components of arguing and how it affects you both in different ways. How does a fight affect you or your partner on a physical level? How can this knowledge help you learn to argue better? Take the time to discuss how you fight and how you can learn to argue better in the future. Always resolve an argument. Never leave an argument without a definitive resolution, even if this takes some time! If things are really tense, reach an agreement to discuss the issue at a later date. It is often a good idea to wait three days after a fight to discuss the core issue(s) proactively, instead of reactively responding in the moment. To read the original article click here. For more articles from Dr. Leaf click here.

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How Challenging Conversations and an Open Mindset Boost Mental & Brain Health + Tips on How to Have Difficult Conversations Correctly and Effectively

AHA Publisher — Wed, 24 Jun 2020 07:00:16 +0000

Dr. Caroline Leaf – I am currently reading an amazing book by Ijeoma Oluo, “So You Want to Talk About Race,” and read a passage that really struck me: “Take care in your conversations, remember that you are dealing with the real hurt of human beings. But be brave in that care, be honest in that care. These conversations will never become easy, but they will become easier. They will never be painless, but they can lessen pain. They will never be risk-free, but they will always be worth it.” This got me thinking: what does having these kinds of conversations look like? How do we get comfortable with the uncomfortable? How do we become brave enough to look in the closet of our personal and public history? How do we face, process and deal with any painful skeletons we may find there? This is something we all need to do—myself included. So, don’t see this blog or podcast as me instructing you. See this as the beginning of many fruitful, painful, uncomfortable, freeing, and powerful discussions we need to start having to live better, healthier, and happier lives. This kind of work is what I call “mind-in-action” work. It is integral to the life well lived. As we face, process and reconceptualize the thoughts, mindsets and worldviews we have in our heads, which have affected and still affect our communication and behavior, we “renew our minds”. This builds up our cognitive resilience and our intellect, and boosts our mental health. Yes, this kind work is both powerful AND painful, but be assured that you are not alone. We are all in this together! 1. Recognize that each person comes to the table with their own lived experiences (their own mental luggage), which affects how they receive your words and messaging. Try to see how someone’s lived experiences, emotions, and trauma are just as valid as yours before you just lash out. 2. Go into the discussion with a learning mindset. This doesn’t mean you have to agree with everything someone says (or even believe everything they say), but it does mean that, by listening with sincerity and integrity, you are both respecting and sharing in their humanity. 3. Before going into a difficult conversation or responding to a challenging idea, pay attention to what your brain and body is telling you. Do you notice any physical or emotional warning signals, such as anger, an adrenalin rush, and so on? Pause and take a few deep breathes (I recommend doing this for 60-90 seconds). Never start a conversation on a highly emotional or agitated note. If you need some time to calm down, that is fine. Say something like “I am not in the right headspace now to give this conversation the attention and emotional strength it deserves. Let’s talk later.” Also, try avoiding tough conversations when you are hungry or tired, as this affects the brain and body, and you will be less likely to make good decisions! 4. Watch how you frame your words. Be careful you don’t put the other person on the defensive from the start, as this will be counterproductive. Be clear, direct and respectful. Don’t assume you know what someone is thinking or trying to say. Avoid trigger words or statements like “you always….”, “just calm down”, “you just think…..” or “you never…”. Rather, say something like “this is my opinion, so let me know if I am misreading you” or “I do not think I understand what you are trying to say, can you clarify…..”. You can also ask questions like “can you explain what you mean….” or “why is this important to you?” I found this helpful: AVOID: “You always…” “Calm down!” “You never…” “You should…” “You must…” & Name calling SAY: How you feel, not what you think Sorry and take responsibility for what you feel you may have done wrong, but don’t say sorry excessively “I feel like you are not quite understanding me, can we talk about this for a minute?” “What I heard you say is ____; is that accurate?” “From your perspective, this is about ____?” “I am struggling to understand…..” 5. Remember that being open-minded and engaging in challenging and difficult conversations is one of the best things you can do for your brain! It strengthens brain muscle, increases stress resilience and cognitive flexibility, and, if done correctly, will build healthy, happy thought structures in your brain! Your brain is always changing (this is called neuroplasticity). How you respond to someone directs this change, determining what is built in your head as a thought structure, which, in turn, affects your mental and physical health, as well as your future behavior. This can be either negative, neutral or positive—the choice is yours. 6. Check your mindset before going into an argument. Are you doing this because you want to win—do you perceive this discussion as a power struggle? Do you see these conversations as zero-sum games, where there is only one winner and one loser? Are you trying to be better or are you just trying to be “right”? Don’t go into a conversation trying to fix someone, correct them or save them. That is not your job. 7. Watch your body language! Stay calm, don’t throw hands up or raise your eyebrows, and try control your facial expressions. Remember, 50% of communication is nonverbal; what you are really thinking will come out through body language. 8. Don’t bring up any past mistakes, arguments or experiences. Talk about what is happening now. Bringing up past hurts and mistakes will only make things worse, putting the other person on the defensive. Encourage the other person to express themselves and be honest with you. 9. Always ask yourself “is what I’m about to say coming from a place of love, or with the goal to win?” Do you want to speak to this person or hurt this person? 10. Watch your tone—keep it even and try to avoid raising it. 11. Before engaging in a conversation on a difficult topic, be sure to educate yourself on all sides by reading books and articles, listening to podcasts or watching talks or documentaries. This does not mean just collecting information that supports your viewpoint! Read and engage with materials that have a different point of view. There is always more you can learn! Educating yourself doesn’t mean you are agreeing to all the ideas. It does, however, allow you to be better informed and more understanding, and will stimulate the brain to think deeply, which is very healthy! 12. Avoid social media fights. Social media is good for a lot of things, but trying to have real, deep and respectful conversations on platforms like Instagram and Facebook is often impossible, and can become very toxic very fast. Avoid being nasty, name-calling and traumatizing people with your comments. And don’t use major platforms to push forward your own point of view. This will only make you look bad, or get you banned for being uncivil. Yes, you are free to speak your mind, but other people are just as free to not listen—especially if it is their platform and you are being discourteous. If you have something to say to someone who has a major platform send them a private email with your points. Be clear, direct, respectful and courteous. 13. Don’t interrupt. This is incredibly annoying even in a happy conversation! Let the other person speak and listen to what they have to say with respect. 14. Take care of your mental and physical wellbeing. Make sure you have a support system in place you can turn to, i.e. a group of people you trust or calming rituals like yoga and deep breathing, which will help you process and deal with challenging conversations. If you are worried a conversation will get very toxic, avoid being alone with that person, and make sure they can’t corner you. To read the original article click here. For more articles from Dr. Leaf click here.

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