All About Health Insurance

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You finally decided you need a counselor. You’ve done your research and found someone that seems like a good fit. The next step is to make an appointment and dive in, right?

Not exactly.

There’s one more step that is easy to skip, but if you take the time to do it now, I promise it will save some headaches down the road.

You’ve got to figure out how to pay for it.

Counseling isn’t free, and there are good reasons for this (read more about that here). But how will you pay for it? You typically have one of two options.

  1. Pay out of pocket (called self-pay).
  2. Use your health insurance benefits.

(If you’re not sure, read this post first to help you decide.)

If you decide to use your health insurance benefits, you will need to know two things.

  1. Does your policy offer mental health benefits? If so, what are they? (If you are doing teletherapy, you will need to check that your policy covers it as well.)
  2. Is the therapist you choose in network with your health insurance?

There are three ways to find out about your benefits.

  1. Consult the information you received when you enrolled in the plan. Benefits are usually listed in detail in this printed material. Often, you can also access this on your company’s HR site.
  2. Log in to your policy online. Go to your insurance company website and sign up for online access. You will need your member number/ID.
  3. Call the number on the back of your card.

As for benefits, these are the numbers you need to know:

Your deductible – this is the amount that you will need to pay out of pocket before your insurance benefits kick in. This number varies greatly among different types of insurance policies. Some people have 0 deductible, while others have a very high deductible. In January, this will be a very important number to you!

Your copay or co-insurance – this is the amount you will need to pay per visit. This is either a fixed amount, or a percentage of what is called the allowable (the maximum amount the insurance company will pay for a particular service).

To find out if your therapist is in network, the easiest way is to ask them (believe me, they will know.) Otherwise, you can call your insurance company or go to the website to find a list of providers in your area.

Generations Counseling Services is currently in network with Anthem Blue Cross/Blue Shield and CareSource (offered through the Marketplace). We do not accept any Medicaid or Medicare plans at this time. If you have an out of state Blue Cross/Blue Shield policy, it will still typically be covered in network. We ask that all clients leave a credit card on file to cover deductibles and copays, and payment is due at the time of service.

In order to use your insurance, please have your information (Member ID, Group number and date of birth) available when you call for your first appointment. We want to provide you with the most seamless care possible, and taking a few moments to make payment arrangements and verify your insurance benefits will make a big difference!

Why Isn’t Therapy Free?

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A few years into my career, I was chatting with an acquaintance about another acquaintance that had gone through a horrible tragedy. Knowing that I was a therapist, she said, “You need to help her.” Then, “And you shouldn’t make it about the money.” She went on to say how a lot of counselors are just in it for money, and that they should just help people because it’s the right thing to do. I was a little rattled – and offended – and although I responded appropriately, I thought of some way better comebacks a few days later.

That exchange got me to thinking a lot about why we counselors charge for our services, and why we need to feel more confident about doing so. If you struggle with the idea of paying for therapy, consider these reasons.

  1. We have significant training and expertise –At the minimum, a licensed master’s level therapist has 2-3 years of post-bachelor’s education and must complete several thousand hours of supervised practice. We must meet state criteria for licensure and are accountable to our state boards of professional regulation. Each year we must complete a minimum number of clinical training hours to keep our licenses current. We also carry malpractice insurance. Many therapists have also obtained additional certificates and training beyond their minimum coursework. When you work with a licensed therapist, you are working with a highly-trained professional.
  2. The therapeutic relationship is not a normal relationship– While good therapy involves talking and laughter maybe even drinking coffee, it is much different than chatting with a friend. Therapy is a one-way relationship, meaning that it is all about the person who is not sitting in the therapist’s chair. It’s one place you get to talk about you all the time, without feeling guilty or worrying about the other person’s needs. Paying the person in the therapist’s chair helps alleviate some of this guilt and allows for important boundaries to be drawn around the relationship.
  3. The therapist is doing more than “just listening”– At every appointment, whether or not you realize it, your therapist is evaluating, assessing and formulating the appropriate treatment. We assess the safety level of our clients, their symptoms, functioning and their interpersonal needs. We make recommendations about what needs to be done to keep people safe, improve their quality of life and help solve their problems. We listen and watch our clients much, much differently than we do people in our other relationships.

Despite all the training and the vetting, not all therapists are created equally. If you feel that your therapist is not honoring the sanctity of your relationship, or if you feel you are not “getting what you pay for,” then it is critically important to talk through this with your provider.

Need more? If you are feeling stuck and need some outside help in managing your communication, emotions, or relationships, our team at Generations Counseling is available! Give us a call at 317-743-8202 or email at: [email protected] today.

8 Signs You Might Need Help With Boundaries

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“I can’t do it any more. I’m done. No matter how much I do for him, there’s always more. Always a need, a request, or a crisis. I’m exhausted.”

Joe is a loving father and caring husband. He works long hours and provides for his family. He is in therapy to get help in his relationship with his adult son, who just hasn’t been able to launch. Speeding tickets, overdue student loans, relationship woes and a string of job losses has caused Joe’s son to be dependent on him – emotionally and financially.

“When I was his age, I was a father! I had health insurance benefits and was already paying into my retirement plan. Now I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to retire, because I’m still supporting him.”

Extreme example?

Not so much.

Next to communication, the problem of boundaries is the most common issue I encounter with my clients. In fact, treatment plans for virtually every person who walks into my office include the goals of “improving communication and boundaries.”

I’ve found boundaries to be one of those elusive concepts that people are familiar with, but don’t completely understand. (Codependence is another.)

In 1992 Henry Cloud and John Townsend wrote an extremely helpful book about boundaries, and it remains a best-selling book today. The cover boasts over 2 million sold.

So we should all be experts, right?

That has not been my experience. In fact, whether we have read the book or not, most of us could use some help in the boundaries department.

In the next few posts I’ll be exploring the topic of boundaries in more detail.

First, let’s talk about how to determine if boundaries are even the problem. Here are some questions to ask yourself:

  1. Have you ever said or thought something like this– “I’m a patient person. I can take and take and take, but when I have had enough, I explode.”?
  2. Do you ever feel “done” with a relationship — particularly with someone you don’t really have the option of being done with, like a parent, child, or sibling?
  3. Is it common for you to feel overwhelmed and burdened by certain people?
  4. Do you often feel like you do all the giving while others do all the taking?
  5. Do you find that you never seem to have enough time to pursue your own interests and activities?
  6. Have you struggled with anger or resentment toward people close to you? Has that resentment started to affect your relationships?
  7. Do you feel like people constantly take advantage of you?
  8. Would you like to just “wipe the slate” clean and get a do-over with your schedule, your responsibilities, or your commitments?

If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, you may have some work to do with boundaries.

Boundaries are figuring out where you end and where another person begins. They’re about figuring out what problems are yours to solve, and what problems belong to other people. Using healthy boundaries requires you to be aware of what you are able and willing to do and then communicating that to others in an effective way. Boundaries are also about learning to accept the consequences that may come with them, and learning to live with the outcome when it is not what you want.

If you could use some help in the boundaries department, stay tuned. In my next post, I’ll talk about the one person you need to start using boundaries with immediately.

Need more? If you are feeling stuck and need some outside help in managing your communication, emotions, or relationships, our team at Generations Counseling is available! Give us a call at 317-743-8202 or email at: [email protected] today.

Let’s Talk: the Last of our Five Part Series on Better Communication

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“I have never told anyone this before…”

“I’ve always wondered if it was my fault.”

“I didn’t think it was a big deal.”

“I wasn’t sure anyone would believe me.”

“I was ashamed…”

“I was embarrassed…”

“I can’t imagine anyone finding out about this…”

It may or may not surprise you to know how often I hear these words uttered in my office. Men, women, children, adults. Age and gender don’t seem to matter. Over and over again I hear the quiet and painful stories of abuse, bullying, name-calling, molesting and more. Secrets people thought they would carry with them to the grave. Things long-buried, semi-forgotten, hidden in the shadows. But then — for no explained reason — these memories intrude upon their lives in the form of flashbacks, nightmares, nausea, fear. Events that cause them to hide from others, numbing their pain, or worse, lash out at ourselves or someone else.

A lot of people think they can handle it, that it’s not a big deal, that they can work through it, or have worked already through it. They don’t want to burden people that love them. They don’t think others will understand. They wonder if it was their fault.

This is not a political post, and I’m not offering opinions about the recent developments in the Christine Blasey Ford testimony, except to say that our inability to talk about terrible things creates enormous personal and societal problems. I can’t help but think how much pain and suffering could be avoided if our culture allowed us to talk about problems when they happen — not decades later. I wonder what our world would be like if girls and women and boys and men could speak up when they are abused or mistreated. If people could be empowered with the tools to care for themselves and others in a timely and healing way.

For a society that is wired and connected and inundated with loads of information, we sure do a terrible job at talking with others about the things that matter deeply to us.

One way you can do this is to be intentional about creating an atmosphere of communication with the people you care about.

Put the phone down. Use current events, television shows and books as springboards for deeper conversations. Be spontaneous as well as scheduled. Carve out time for just being together and put it on your calendar as you would any other important event. Talk over shared activities. Build a fire. Keep board games in the family room. Ask open-ended questions. Good communication takes time — be intentional about investing this time in your loved ones.

At Generations Counseling, we want to support you in your efforts to connect with the important people in your life. To help move all of us toward more talking, more listening, and more helping, we are launching a new event called Second Tuesdays. Beginning November 13, on the second Tuesday of each month, we will host a discussion on events that are important to our mental health and our local community. Our goal is to give people in schools, workplaces and families the tools and information they need to have important conversations.

Our first topic is Family & Politics: Tips for Surviving the Holidays in a Hostile Climate. Yikes, I know. It’s a tough one. But we need to talk about it. We will be offering tips and strategies for navigating relationships with people we may love, but don’t agree with. We share ideas for learning to communicate more thoughtfully, more helpfully, more respectfully, and hopefully help avoid some of the family drama that always seems to accompany the holidays.

This is a free event, open to the public. We would love to have you join us.

To stay connected, follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest, or scroll to the top of this page to subscribe to our monthly newsletter.

P.S. To sum up all the info in our communication series, we’ve created a free download.

To get yours, click here.

Need more? If you are feeling stuck and need some outside help in managing your communication, emotions, or relationships, our team at Generations Counseling is available! Give us a call at 317-743-8202 or email at: [email protected] today.

Two Questions You Must Answer In Order to Improve Your Communication (Communication, Part 4/5)

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What’s your goal?

This is an important question, and one that typically comes up early in therapy. I’m a big fan of defining goals, early and often.

My most successful clients typically answer this question with something to the effect of: “I need to learn how to…” or “I want to be better at…” They go on to spell out a goal that involves them making some kind of change.

My most frustrated clients tend to answer the question more like this: “I need for [my spouse, child, mother-in-law….] to stop [doing what I don’t want them to] and start [doing what I want them to]”.

The frustration comes in when I break the news to them that I can’t help them reach that goal. Unless they recognize that they are the only ones they have the power to change, they typically get mad at me and end up dropping out.

Most of my clients are interested — at some level — in improving their communication. Because, let’s face it — most of us are in therapy because our relationships aren’t working in the way we would like them to.

When we are having communication problems, it is natural to point the finger at the other person — if we could just get that person to be more rational, reasonable, understanding, kind — then our communication problems will be solved.

But unfortunately, this just isn’t true.

I hate to be black and white here, but if you are having communication problems in your life, then you are the one that needs to change.

Sometimes that change involves setting firmer boundaries — ending conversations before they become toxic, or learning to recognize unhealthy relationships. Sometimes it involves improving a skill, learning to be less defensive or being more clear with others about what we need.

Sometimes we have to add new tools and skills to our repertoire, sometimes we have to improve the ones we already have.

One of the best ways to get better at communication is to look back at the past. I know that doesn’t sound right — I mean, aren’t we always supposed to be looking forward?

Generally, yes. But looking back at our past interactions can be incredibly enlightening and help us dramatically improve our communication skills.

Years ago, I was working very hard at improving my own communication. I had one relationship, in particular, where conversations always seemed to end in some sort of misunderstanding and conflict. I’d been thinking about this a lot, and working on how I could do things differently. One afternoon, as this person and I sat down to talk, I brought my best skills and laid them out on the table.

It was a disaster.

The conversation ended much like others had, and as the person walked away from me in frustration, I started down the road of beating myself up. “There you go again. Why do you always have to let things get out of hand?”

But since I had been doing a lot of work, I was able to regroup. “The important thing is that you’re trying,” I told myself. This little bit of validation settled me down. This enabled me to ask another critical question: “Is there anything you could have done differently?”

And of course, I was able to identify several things that I could have done to handle the interaction more skillfully.

I vowed to try those things the next conversation, and sure enough it went a little better. With a lot of effort on both our parts, we have been able to vastly improve our relationship. Sure, we both contributed to the communication problem, and both of us had to change the way we did things. But more often than not — especially in relationships where two people truly care for one another — it just takes one person to get the ball rolling on that change. When we communicate more effectively, it inevitably influences the other person. They have no choice but to respond.

(Side note: sometimes the other person will respond negatively, even becoming more destructive and unhealthy. When this happens, we often have to step away from the relationship. Sometimes temporarily, sometimes permanently. You can tell how emotionally healthy a person is by the way they respond to appropriate boundaries.)

To recap–in order to communicate more effectively, you must learn to ask yourself two critical questions:

  1. What’s my goal? If your goal is focused on you, your contribution, your perception and your behavior, you will have an exponentially better chance of reaching that goal.
  2. What could I do differently? This takes courage, to look at our finest, and not-so-finest moments. We can, and should, learn from both.

Need more? If you are feeling stuck and need some outside help in managing your communication, emotions, or relationships, our team at Generations Counseling is available! Give us a call at 317-743-8202 or email at: [email protected] today.

Another Simple Thing You Can Do to Have Less Conflict & Better Relationships (Communication, 3/5)

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Have you ever found yourself in a ridiculous conversation that devolved into a completely irrelevant topic — so much so that you couldn’t even remember what you were arguing about in the first place?

Yes. Yes you have.

Joe: I told you on Tuesday that we had this dinner appointment — you never listen to me and now we are going to be late!

You: You did not tell me on Tuesday! 10 minutes ago was the first I heard of it.

Joe: I distinctly remember telling you. You had just hung up the phone with your mother and you were mad at her which is why you didn’t pay attention to a word I said. You never pay attention to me!

You: I didn’t even talk to my mother all day on Tuesday. The last time I talked to her was on Sunday, and I know that’s true because she called me yesterday and she said she hadn’t talked to me for three days.

Now. What was the problem?

It happens so often, this conversation pattern is a ‘thing’. I’m not sure what the experts call it, but I call it exhausting.

It’s so easy to do. We find ourselves sucked into purposeless conversations that leave all the parties completely worn out and unable to address the real problem.

So many families/couples/individuals come into my office and simply say, “I’m tired. I’m exhausted. We have the same conversations, over and over, and I can tell you exactly how they’re going to go.”

I don’t have a magic wand for this one, but I can share a tool with you that you may not have tried.

Seriously. It will be so easy you will wonder why you didn’t think of it. (You didn’t, because you’re tired.)

The way to work smarter instead of harder in communication is simply this:

Focus on the process, not the content.

What do I mean by that?

Let’s look at the conversation you and Joe just had.

Joe: I told you on Tuesday that we had this dinner appointment — you never listen to me and now we are going to be late!

You: You did not tell me on Tuesday! 10 minutes ago was the first I heard of it.

Joe: (because he’s done a lot of work in this area he can now say…) Well, I thought I told you Tuesday, but maybe I just imagined it. Anyway, I’m feeling frustrated now, because it really means a lot to me to introduce you to my boss, and now I’m worried we’re going to be late for dinner.

You: (because you’ve been reading this blog you can now say…) Shoot, I am really sorry. I’ve been looking forward to meeting your boss, and I definitely don’t want to make you late. How about you drive and I’ll put some makeup on in the car?

And later….after dinner….you can say, “And Joe, you know earlier, when you said I never listen to you? I felt really defensive after that, because even though I know I sometimes tune you out, the word ‘never’ really gets to me, because I can think of times that I do listen to you. I feel like you make generalizations when you’re angry and everything I’ve ever messed up on in our relationship gets thrown in the pot…”

And so on.

Now I know this isn’t magic, but it does work. I can tell you that it works, because I’ve done it myself, and I’ve taught my clients to do it as well.

Focusing on the process over the content ignores the “who, what, where, when” arguments that we seem to be determined to have. Those arguments that make us feel picked apart and exhausted. The ones that get us no where and leave us feeling like every conversation we have is the same song, second verse.

By focusing on the process (Use the formula: “When you…I feel…I need….”), we give the other person a little more space to think through what they feel and they need, rather than putting them on the defensive and trying to figure out how to prove us wrong.

Process communication focuses on what’s happening beneath the surface, not the minor, annoying details. Process communication gives the people we care about a chance to catch their breath, and gives us a chance to be heard. It’s subtle way of doing things differently. Instead of driving endlessly on a country road trying to figure out where we’re going and how we’re going to get there, process communication provides a map — a sense of context and a destination.

All the parties involved may not agree exactly on how to get there, but at least there’s a reference point.

The hardest part about doing process communication is that we have to do two things at once:

  1. we have to focus on how we feel, on how the interaction is affecting us and
  2. we have to step away from that emotion and share it in a non-defensive, grown-up way

There’s actually a third thing. We also have to be aware of what we need, and learn to ask for that in a way that doesn’t put the other person on the defensive.

In process communication we have to let go of our right to be right, and focus on the other person’s right to be heard. We have to validate the other person’s feelings as valid — not because we understand them or agree with them, but simply because another person has them.

Now I know this is easier said than done, but if you have had the same conversation over and over again only to land at the same place, it might be worth a shot to do things differently.

Need more? If you are feeling stuck and need some outside help in managing your communication, emotions, or relationships, our team at Generations Counseling is available! Give us a call at 317-743-8202 or email at: [email protected] today.

1 Simple Thing You Can Do to Have Less Conflict and Better Relationships (Communication, Part 2/5)

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Kim — a bright and spunky teenager — had a long history of fighting with her mom. After a couple sessions with them together, I requested to meet with Kim’s mom one on one. She launched right in to tell me how prickly Kim was. “It never fails. We sit down to have a normal conversation. I know both of us want things to go well. But inevitably, it turns into this enormous fight. She gets completely defensive and I lose my cool. Half the time I can’t even remember what we were trying to talk about. She storms off and tells me I’m the worst mom ever.”

Mom was very interested in trying to help me understand how unreasonable her daughter could be. And, I honestly couldn’t argue. Kim was a difficult kid.

Got a prickly person in your life?

However, I had to figure out a way to gently let mom know that she was probably the one who needed to change.

I asked Mom to tell me about a recent fight.

“Well just yesterday, in a perfectly normal voice, I asked Kim to please put away the dishes. Immediately she started whining about what a bad day she’d had and how exhausted she was from school and a pop science quiz.”

Mom rolled her eyes.

“I absolutely lost it. I had a bad day too and I guarantee you I’m as exhausted as she is! Can you please just help me figure out how to get through to this girl?”

What I had to explain to Kim’s mom, and anyone else who struggles to have normal conversations with people-they-love-who-can-sometimes-be-a-little-prickly, is the secret of validation.

When someone tells you they have had a bad day — for whatever reason — the last thing they want to hear is that they are overreacting, that someone has it worse, or that their problems aren’t that big of a deal.

At least I know that when I’ve had a bad day, what I really want is for someone to put their arms around me and say, “I’m sorry. It sounds like you are exhausted. Is there anything I can do to help?”

When someone says something like that, it can absolutely take our breath away. We feel understood, valued, connected. And most of the time, we find ourselves less defensive and more cooperative.

While I was in grad school, I spent several years in therapy. I was a single mom, going to school, working all the time, and financially at the end of my rope. One afternoon I lamented to my therapist about something that had happened to me many years ago. I KNOW I was being whiny, and I’m sure I was overreacting to whatever this was. Even I was annoyed with my angst. I pretty much expected him to tell me to put on my big girl pants and get on with my life.

But he didn’t.

Instead, he just waited for me to take a breath, and then said simply, “Oh my goodness, Joanna. That must have been so hard for you.”

I can’t tell you how relieved I felt to know that someone “got” it.

And weirdly, his kind words actually made me want to suck it up a little and stop my whining.

This is the power of validation. Honestly, something about being human is that we sometimes just want someone to bear witness to our pain. It doesn’t matter if we are being irrational or unreasonable. We just need someone to truly hear what we are saying — whether or not they agree with us — and say, “I get you. I can see how that would have been upsetting to you.”

I try to get married couples to do this all the time and honestly, most of them are terrible at it.

When I explain the concept of validation, and they try it, at first it usually sounds like, “I’m sorry you feel that way, but….” or “You don’t have to be so upset,” or “Yeah, well maybe now you can understand why I was so mad the other day…” and so on. (#jobsecurity)

Instead, true validation, to quote the very-wise Brené Brown, sounds something like this: “I don’t even know what to say right now, I’m just so glad you told me.” (This is a great video about empathy vs. sympathy and the power of validation.)

Over the last 10 years I have spent a lot of time on both sides of the couch, and I’ve learned a lot about how to do validation well. (Doesn’t mean I always do it well, it’s just that I know it when I see it.)

If you want to have better connections with the people you love and reduce the likelihood of conflict in your relationships, you would be wise to develop the very fine art of offering validation. Here are some ways you can work on it:

1. Think about the person, not the problem. Okay – your kid is being annoying, for sure. But underneath the annoyance is a person that you would literally give your life for, and they’re having a bad day. Whether or not you can relate to that, try to imagine how THEY might be experiencing their circumstances, and then mirror that back to them. “It sounds like you are really frustrated with your math teacher.” or “I can imagine you’d rather be doing just about anything than putting away the dishes right now.”

2. Distance yourself from your emotions. I know this is super hard because I’ve had to do it myself. When someone comes at you with an accusation or a complaint, it is easy to let those defenses come up. But defensiveness doesn’t solve problems. Try to step away from the emotion you’re feeling, and focus instead on how you would like to feel tomorrow, when this moment is over. Wouldn’t you like to remember this as Carl being kind of a jerk and you being calm, cool and collected? “Carl, it sounds like you’re really angry with me. How can we work together to fix this problem?”

3. Remember that you don’t have to be profound. I read a story one time about a guy whose father passed away. He was recalling all the unintentionally-insensitive things people said to him at the funeral. He said the one person that made the biggest impact on him, the one that gave him the most comfort, the one whose presence he treasured the most — was the one who just sat next to him and never said a word. Our quiet presence can sometimes be the most powerful form of validation.

4. Never underestimate the power of humor. A little humor, in the right dose, can often be just the thing. One time I was with a friend who did childcare. We were trying to talk and were both terribly annoyed with the kids who were being super annoying. All at once, she turned to me and said, “I feel like pinching someone.” Her honest self-disclosure had the perfect amount of humor and was so validating to me — who at the time was always beating myself up for not being the perfect mother. (That was then, by the way. I now fully accept that I have and will continue to mess up my kids.)

Validation is way easier said than done, but I promise, it is an art form and it can be learned. It just takes practice.

Need more? If you are feeling stuck and need some outside help in managing your communication, emotions, or relationships, our team at Generations Counseling is available! Give us a call at 317-743-8202 or email at: [email protected] today.

Stop Fighting. Start Communicating: #1 in a 5 Part-Series on Really Improving Your Communication

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Joe and Suzy have been married for 15 years. Lately, Joe has been spending more and more time at work, and Suzy says he’s being a selfish workaholic. She even wonders if he is having an affair. Joe agrees — he has been spending more time at the office — but he says Suzy’s nagging and complaining has left him with no other choice. Joe says the office is just a welcome respite from the strife at home.

Sure, Joe and Suzy have a marriage problem, but more specifically, they have a communication problem.

In relationships, communication is everything. And as you well know, communication isn’t just what we say, it’s how we say it. It’s also what we don’t say. As therapists, we are trained to look at and interpret non-verbals — but let’s get real — if you have a relationship with anyone in your life, you are probably pretty good at cueing in on those non-verbals as well.

Improving communication is a worthy goal; however, it is MUCH easier said than done.

But don’t lose heart–it can be done. Over the next couple weeks, I’ll be sharing a 5 part series with some really practical tips that you can begin using immediately to improve your communication with your spouse, your kids, your boss, or anyone else that is driving you nuts.

One of the biggest problems with talking to other people — especially talking to people we love about issues we care about — is those pesky things called “emotions.” Have you ever started a conversation with the intent to be calm, cool and collected, only to have the whole thing devolve into a ridiculous argument in the matter of seconds?

You’re not alone. The problem is your emotions. When we imagine ourselves calmly talking about a difficult topic, we often fail to factor in the possibility that we are going to be “triggered” by the other person’s verbals or non-verbals. Even a slight tilt of the head, the smallest roll of the eye or the teeniest hint of a sigh can send us reeling and completely derail our communication.

The reason this happens is probably about the past — you have either experienced this same scenario with this same person a hundred times, or, you have experienced the same scenario with a DIFFERENT person a long time ago. Our brain doesn’t really stop to evaluate the current scenario. With that one little cue, our brains scan our memory files for every other time in our lives we encountered tilted heads, rolled eyes and testy sighs and responds to all of those events all at the same time.

This is called “flooding” — our systems become flooded, or overwhelmed with emotion, and we start thinking all kinds of things and drawing all sorts of conclusions about why this time or this person is just like all the others. Then, rather than reacting to what is actually happening in the current moment, we react to what we think the other person is thinking, feeling or doing.

And that’s really where communication breaks down.

So my first tip in improving communication is this: change your PERSPECTIVE. When we lose our cool in conversations, it is very likely that we have also lost perspective. We are either flooded with memories from the past, or catapulting ourselves into some horrible outcome in the future.

Taking on a new perspective involves some practice and self-discipline, so don’t get discouraged if it doesn’t come naturally. Here are some things you can try:

1. Focus on the big picture – what does this person mean to you? How would you feel if you knew this was the last conversation you’d ever have? What are your long-term goals for this relationship?

2. Focus on what you have in common – you and your spouse may not agree on how to discipline the kids, but you do agree that you want them to learn from their mistakes, or that you want them to grow up to be productive adults. Rather than zeroing in on the areas where you disagree, look for the things you both want.

3. Think about when you have been successful in the past – If this is a long-term relationship, try to think about times in the past when you have had productive conversations with this person. What went well? What was different about that time? Did you do anything differently? If this is someone with whom you don’t have a history, think about times in the past when YOU have been effective in your communication. What did you do that was so useful?

4. Think about how you would like to feel about this tomorrow – When you look back on this conversation, what do you want to remember? Do you want to spend time beating yourself up for losing your cool — again — or would you rather feel a sense of satisfaction at having handled yourself well?

5. Put yourself in their shoes – ugh — easier said than done, I know, but it can be helpful to legitimately allow yourself to consider where the other person is coming from. What about them don’t you know? (Maybe it’s a sales clerk who had a horrible day. Maybe your spouse just got chewed out at work, or has spent the afternoon with a grumpy teenager). No matter how well you know the person, or how well you think you know the situation, there may be information you don’t have. How might that information impact this conversation? If you are really up for a challenge, try a bit of a role reversal. Switch roles with whoever you’re talking to — have them take your perspective, and you take theirs. How does it feel to have this conversation from another point of view?

Remember – this takes practice — but changing your perspective can have a dramatic impact on your communication. And if you get this one mastered, stay tuned for our next fun topic: validation.

Need more? If you are feeling stuck and need some outside help in managing your communication, emotions, or relationships, our team at Generations Counseling is available! Give us a call at 317-743-8202 or email at: [email protected] today.

Transitions are hard

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I cannot tell you how thrilled I am to be living and working in the Greenwood/Indianapolis area. I enjoyed attending the State Fair this past weekend (I may or may not have had my share of a warm funnel cake…), and I’m very excited about all the cool antique stores and flea markets in my area.

But as with any move, this has been a huge transition, and not all of it has been fun. For the past few weeks I feel like all I’ve been doing is updating my address and phone number, unpacking boxes and trying to find my way around a new community.

I’ve known for a long time that I would eventually move to this area, but I wanted to wait until my youngest graduated from high school. When the day finally came, it was a little surreal — it’s one thing to talk about doing something, it’s totally different to actually follow through and take action.

I’m not going to lie — it’s been hard. I’ve had to say a lot of goodbyes lately, and there have been more than a few tears shed. Even though I know I’ve made the right decision, it’s been difficult to walk away from a full practice, dear friends, and lots of professional connections.

Of course, coming home to the welcoming arms of my extended family has made things a lot more bearable — I just hired my nephew to mow my lawn and I can now refer clients to my sister who is a Greenwood colleague!

One thing that has helped me through the hard times is to remind myself something I frequently tell my clients: transitions are hard. Good ones, bad ones — it doesn’t matter. Change is hard, and it often requires all the emotional and physical strength we can muster. When we’re facing change, it’s so important to give ourselves the gift of time. We need time to grieve, time to adjust, and time to settle in. It’s amazing how the simple act of giving ourselves permission to take the time we need can settle us down.

As someone who’s endured more than a few transitions, I would love to opportunity to help you navigate yours. If I can help, please don’t hesitate to call.