Why the photo?

Colleagues,

I hope everyone had a great Memorial Day. Thanks, Mara, for Monday’s message, and thanks to everyone for feedback on last week’s 5x5 challenge.
 
Thursday’s challenge included finding a picture of yourself as a child and treating yourself as you would that child. Today let’s dig just a bit more deeply into the why behind it.
 
There are two kinds of stress:

• Distress leads to impaired thinking, judgment, and negative physical effects.
• Eustress energizes and helps bring us into a flow state.

 
When we place excess expectations on ourselves, 
when we beat ourselves up,
when we focus on what we didn’t do and what didn’t work out,
we move ourselves into a state of distress.
 
When we create realistic expectations,
when we are gentle with ourselves,
when we focus on our strengths and successes,
we move ourselves into a state of eustress.
 
So why the child picture?
 
It may be easier to recognize how damaging negative talk is when we connect it with our child-selves.
It may be easier for us to praise ourselves when we connect it to our child-selves.
 
In a nutshell, take care of yourself.
 
Cheers!
 
Frederick