talk some sense to me

I’m so sorry to hear you’re going through such a painful time. But please hang in there. I’ve experienced deep sadness and hopelessness and what I can say is that it’s horrible, but there is an end to it, and it is not to end your existence, but to remember that you are able to experience joy and peace and love. The feeling of having failed others just by being here is a terrible thing to experience, but that is not the full picture. Even if your friend is telling you she’s a little worn down by how much you’ve need her, the fact that she has chosen to help you means she thinks positively of you, that you’ve earn her feelings of affection, whichever these might be. It is hard to see the full picture when you’re in pain, but don’t believe all the negative things your mind might be telling you, there is a lot more of who you are than that.

I don’t know if I can offer you much advise, but I can tell you this: I am happy that you’re here. Because it means that you’re fighting, it means also that my own feelings of terrible sadness are not alone in this world, that there are people out there also trying really hard to get better, to fight back, to not give up. Please don’t give up. The moments when you’re feeling defeated by these tricky negative feelings is not the time for making any big decisions. It can help to treat is as you would a physical wound or illness, to get rest and to breathe through the pain, and eventually it will heal, even if it’s just a little bit each day.

like you, I cannot afford therapy, but I can share with you some of the tools I’ve found here and there to help me through. There’s two forms of activities that are like therapy that have helped me a lot, maybe you might want to try.

One is EMDR, eye movement desensitization and reprocessing. You don’t need a therapist for this, and I often try it myself with a YouTube video or something like it ,of a ball moving from left to right on the screen. That’s the idea, to follow with your eyes left to right an object while you think of your target (the emotions that are affecting you). Then you switch to a positive belief about yourself, even if it doesn’t feel like the truth, and do the eye movement again. The point is to help your body relax and stop sending you strong messages that might cause distress.

Butterfly hugs work the same way, you cross your arms around you and tap rhythmically on your shoulders, left, right, left right… it helps your brain get out of the fight/flight response and it might help you relax.

And always remember to breathe, breathe deeply and let your body relax. Sit for a minute somewhere and just breathe with a soft glaze on your surroundings. Maybe you’ll see the leaves on the trees moving softly, or a little ant trying to find her way through the wall… allow yourself this little bits of time to reconnect and to nurture yourself, you deserve it, you really do.

The other activity I do when I am struggling is tapping therapy. You can find lots of examples online, just google EFT (emotional freedom techniques). It is a simple, repetitive exercise to soothe your nervous system and help your vagus nerve relax. You can look up the tapping points, is on your hand, top of the head, front of eyebrow, back of eyebrow, under the eye, under the nose, chin, near your heart and under the arm.

The first line you say while doing the tapping is very moving to me. You say:”even though I (add negative emotion/belief here) I deeply and completely love and accept myself”, for example you might say “even though I feel that I’m a failure, I deeply and completely love and accept myself”. You repeat this 3 times then start adding feelings and contrasting those with positive beliefs. The point is not to deny your negative feelings, they are real enough, but they are not the full picture.

I’ve also found a couple free groups on meetup that do sessions like this, and other support groups there too.

It helps to remember that emotional distress also happens in the body, and you can try to reach yourself through your body, always doing what feels right for you, even if that means to rest for the day.

another useful resource for me has been meditation, and there’s an app called Waking Up that if you email them telling them you can’t afford to pay their subscription they will give it to you for free for a year, no questions asked. And you can renew after that year too.

I like Waking Up, it has short meditations and conversations with many interesting people, many of them healers in their own way. Maybe one of them will resonate with you. I like to listen to their talks while I work, like a podcast.

My favorite is David Whyte, he reads his poems in the app and talks through them, I find it very soothing..

and metta meditation is a very good way to give back, when you cannot physically do so, even if it’s just in the wish to give back. You think of someone you care deeply about, and you say to yourself thinking of them: “may you be happy, May you be free from suffering “ sometimes is good to remind ourselves that we do wish good things to people, even if we blame ourselves for leaning in them too heavily at times. When you remind yourself of that you can begin to acknowledge that you’re not a bad person for needing them, and you’re working on getting better, and that’s ok, as long as no one gets hurt.

and through my school library I’ve found access to books and audiobooks that have helped me through some rough times. “Radical Compassion” by Tara Brach is one of these books, it might be free online too..

I am just sharing what has helped me, and I hope can help you.

You’re strong, don’t forget that. You’re not alone.