394 - 50 Ways to Handle Jealousy - Part 1
Jealousy toolkit
The first half of our series on handling jealousy has 26 different techniques for handling jealousy, whether for your brain or your body.
For the brain
Tools for your brain to combat repetitive and unwanted or intrusive thoughts:
Write out your toolkit ahead of time.
Journal dump - Train of thought, stream of consciousness journaling.
Mind mapping - Drawing pictures, drawing a web, illustrating everything going on in your brain.
Just the facts, ma’am - Writing out the situation with no value judgments, like a reporter or a scientist.
The unique list - List all the things that are great, special, unique about you, without qualifying them.
What’s the opposite of this thought? - Identify a few primary thoughts that are swirling around and write out what the exact opposite of the thought might be, and see what it brings up for you.
Emotion wheel - MA episode 348! Use an emotion wheel or other tool to pinpoint precisely what’s coming up for you and keep track of that.
Therapist dump - If you’ve already got an established relationship with a therapist and you feel they are supportive of you, reach out to them. It might be good to use the Triforce or be explicit about what you’re hoping for from them.
Chair work - Create a dialogue with the conflicting parts of you. If you’ve identified one part of you that’s freaked out and one part of you that wants to be supportive, have those two parts have a conversation together.
CBT worksheets - Again, if you’re finding most of your distress is cognitive, taking a CBT approach can be helpful. Tons of CBT worksheets online for free that can help you sort out your thought process and ways to improve your thought process.
Workbooks - Kathy Labriola’s jealousy workbook, Kitty Chambliss’s jealousy workbook, if you do well with structured exercises.
Distract and/or reward the inner toddler - let yourself indulge, within appropriate limits for yourself. Wine, cigarette, comfort movie, comfort food, new video game, etc.
Pick a new skill to learn.
Crafting project or art project - A constructive activity that helps get you into the zone.
Put your phone away, or step away from social media and the news. Unless you know which type of content legitimately comforts you - animal videos only, makeup TikToks only, etc.
Sleep sounds/Sleep With Me podcast - super helpful if you have trouble sleeping or if you’re not used to sleeping alone.
For the body
Tools to combat going into survival mode or physiological responses include:
SIFT through it.
Movement - Exercise, yoga, dance, structured or unstructured, letting your body do what it’s craving. If anger or aggression comes up, that’s okay to explore, but put some limits around it.
Progressive relaxation – Tensing and relaxing different muscle groups at a time to encourage relaxation. Pay attention to jaw, neck, and belly! Plenty of progressive relaxation meditations and videos available online for free.
Orienting - Counting, finding the blue thing etc., get curious about the details in the room. Corners of the room, sense of smell, sound.
Self touch - Comforting touch, baths, pleasant sensory experiences, or orgasm etc.
Comforting touch from others - Platonic cuddling, cuddle groups, or connecting with another partner (MA 361).
Humming, Singing, or Om-ing
Consulted a 2018 systematic review of studies on breathwork. Found that humming in particular generates more nitric oxide, which sterilizes the air your breathe, increases arterial oxygen, and reduces blood pressure.
Stimulates the vagus nerve, which helps to activate your parasympathetic nervous system.
Improves heart rate variability, which is a measure of how well your body can move out of a stress state into a relaxed state.
Ice pack on neck - A small 2018 study published in JMIR Formative Research found that 16 seconds of cold stimulation to the lateral neck area increased heart rate variability and also lowered blood pressure.
Pet an animal. - Many studies on this.
Find a way to laugh.
Stay tuned for next week when we’ll explore the final 24 tools for handling jealousy.
Transcript
This document may contain small transcription errors. If you find one please let us know at info@multiamory.com and we will fix it ASAP.
Jase: On this episode of the Multiamory podcast, we're talking about 50 ways to handle jealousy. Well, actually, this is the first of a two-parter episode. Today, we're talking about the first 26 ways to handle jealousy, and then next week, we'll do the remaining 24. This is the question that pretty much every polyamorous or non-monogamous person gets asked, "How do you deal with the jealousy?" This is not even unique to non-monogamy or polyamory at all. Jealousy can come up in monogamous relationships, even in friendships, or any number of different relationships, but we do always tend to get the question if we're non-monogamous.
To have a functioning non-monogamous relationship often means we need to redefine our relationship to jealousy. That relationship can change over time, but there are still times when it comes up. Remember that you can feel compersion or happiness for your partner having other relationships and you can also feel envy or jealousy at the same time. Those things aren't mutually exclusive. If you feel those, you're not failing. There's nothing wrong with you, but it is important to have tools at your disposal for how to handle that.
In these two episodes, we're going to be going through all of these different techniques for emotional regulation, for handling your jealousy so that if you're ever in need, you can come back to these two episodes and just listen through it and see which ones sound interesting to try. Maybe there's a new one you want to try. Maybe there's a reminder of one that's worked for you in the past. Hopefully, this can be a really great resource for you to come back to anytime you need it.
Dedeker: When I wrote this episode and, specifically, the title of this episode, I was very intentional with my choice of words of calling it 50 ways to handle jealousy, so not cope with jealousy, not manage your jealousy, not tame your jealousy, not deal with your jealousy. I suppose that, in my mind, I wanted it to be a little bit more positive like animal handling. We handle the animal. We're gentle and we're compassionate, but we're also in control at the same time.
Jase: We do have proficiency in animal handling, so that's great.
Dedeker: Yes, right? Put a lot of points into that. That's the image that I wanted here for all of these things is that this isn't about trying to crush it or trying to cram it into a little box or trying to find the pill that I'm going to take, that's going to eliminate and cure all my jealousy. It's about handling it.
Emily: I think it's interesting that you say the word "control" as well because when you're in really heightened emotional moments, that control sometimes feels like the first thing to go out the window. Your cognition is low. Your ability to put yourself back into one piece is low. I think that's why episodes like these are so important because it can be difficult to know which tool to grab.
If you have potentially 50 at your disposal, not that you're going to take every single tool that we give you, but the ones that really resonate with you, I think it's important to be able to go and say, "Okay, I'm going to try this, see how it works because I want to be able to get back to a place of not feeling such intense emotion that causes me to potentially react in a negative way or feel really awful for a longer period of time." It can bring us back to that moment of peace and control and being able to feel good again in the moment.
We divided this big list of 50 into four different sections. We're going to do two of those sections this episode and then two sections next episode. All of the sections, I'll preview right now. First, we're going to do tools for your brain. Second, we're going to do tools for your body. Third, tools for your relationships. Fourth, tools for your heart and soul. Going a little bit more internal or deeper woo-woo, soul-feeling in those moments, but those two last ones are going to be in the next episode.
Dedeker: The disclaimer is that this is the most useful if you're in a situation where you know that things are above board. What I mean by that is I'm happily consenting to being in a non-monogamous relationship. My partner and I have communicated about their plans going on a date or like what's going on in their other relationships, but I'm still feeling jealousy, right?
I want to distinguish that from other situations where I think that feeling intense envy or intense jealousy can be 100% legitimate. It can be 100% an alarm bell going off that's telling you, "Oh, my God, someone is not treating me well. I'm not getting what I need in this relationship. This attachment is slipping away from me. Someone is lying to me. Someone's neglecting me. Someone's intentionally excluding me."
All of those are legitimate situations where it's understandable and correct to be upset and to feel jealousy. If that's what's going on for you or if there are fundamental issues with relationship security, there isn't a single tool that can fix just that. We do have an entire other podcast and backlog talking about all those other relationship and attachment-supporting tools. That's not necessarily what we're talking about today. Other times, it's just about detoxing from old scripts.
This is something that's come up a lot with my clients, people who come to me and are like, "I wanted this in the first place. I wanted a non-monogamous relationship. I encourage my partner to go on the date. Then now that they're on the date, I'm freaking out and I don't know why. My partner hasn't done anything wrong. I'm just having all these reactions and these feelings coming up." Again, like Jase was saying, this list could just be 50 ways to regulate your emotions.
It doesn't have to just be about jealousy. It can be about whatever intense emotions are coming up for you in a particular moment. Without further ado, let's get into talking about tools for your brain. These are specific tools if you're someone where your feelings of jealousy tend to be very cognitive, so they can manifest as repetitive thoughts, intrusive thoughts, thought spiraling, inability to focus on anything else.
If that's you, you might consider trying some of these things. Tool number one, I highly recommend writing out your toolkit ahead of time. What that looks like is when you're not in a moment of intense feelings or intense jealousy, taking the time to sit down and write out, "What are the things that do tend to help me when I'm feeling intense emotions," or you could just save this podcast episode or consult the transcript, right?
Something that I've done in the past is also categorizing my own personal tools, including like, "Okay, these are my own ground rules for my own behavior, these are the tools that I know tend to work for me, and then these are like the 'break glass in case of emergency,' I'm really freaking out, and these are the things that I can turn to." Again, having this written down and accessible ahead of time so that when emotions are high and cognition is low, you have something else to turn to. You're not relying just on your own power to whip out something and make a decision about what you're going to do and what's going to help you.
Jase: Being proactive instead of reactive is always so helpful. Number two is to do a journal dump. You all know that I like to talk about journaling a lot because, for me, when I get caught up in those thoughts, they're just going around and around and around in my mind. Sometimes I'm not even totally aware of what they are because they're just cycling in the background, and so just doing journaling where you're just writing down whatever's in your head.
There's not really a structure or a goal to it. It's more a stream of consciousness or a train of thought. It could be writing as if you're explaining it to someone else. It could just be notes for yourself, whatever it is. Just the point is that you're putting it down on paper. I find it's best to write it by hand. Although if, for you, typing or something like that works better, that's certainly helpful too.
Emily: Number three is mind mapping. This is something I believe we've talked about in previous episodes and it's kind of similar to journaling. Mind mapping can help you to map out in an artistic fashion like, linearly, what is going on in your brain. It doesn't even need to be linear. It can just be whatever the heck is going on. Draw something that feels angry. Draw something that exposes what happened to you in the past that may be leading you in a certain direction with what's happening at this particular moment in time. It can be whatever.
Jase: Because mind mapping is something that's used in project planning or life organization, there's also a lot of apps out there for doing this where you basically have all the different bubbles that you put text in and connect them with lines. That's essentially what the mind map is in that way. There's also a fun VR one I played with where you actually, with your VR goggles on, could place items and then you speak. It does the microphone to transcribe and then you can link them up and walk around through your mind map. That's maybe a bit overboard, but, hey, it might help distract you from what you're worried about if you're-
Emily: That's pretty cool.
Jase: -trying to build your VR mind map.
Emily: Wow.
Dedeker: Tool number four is called, "Just the fact, ma'am/sir, non-gender, specific honorable title person." This can be a journaling prompt as well. It's writing out what the situation is with zero-value judgments, writing it out the way a reporter or a scientist might. This exercise helps to discourage you from any catastrophizing that you may want to put into the situation, any coloring with your own emotions, the sense of like, "Ah, they're going to leave me," or "I'm horrible and unlovable." Like it's literally just writing out what is happening. That may not fix all of your emotions about it, but it can help to create a little bit of distance and maybe even make the situation seem a little bit less big and overwhelming.
Emily: This is something my therapist does a lot with me just because our emotions color our perceptions so much. We may be feeling really down on ourselves and then, therefore, we spit out a thing that we think is a fact and it, in fact, isn't. It's just our perception of maybe the situation that occurred. I love the idea of really getting very granular and writing down facts about something and seeing, "Oh, okay, actually, did they ever say this thing about me? Have they ever noted that they dislike this thing about me in the past or whatever, or if it's a jealousy situation, did they ever say that this person was better at this thing than I am?" Not necessarily. That helps to alleviate all of those stresses potentially.
Jase: Yes, I do like that. I definitely had a therapist who would do that a lot to me when I would be worried about performances like if I played a show or something. I'd be like, "I think everyone disliked it," and she'd say, "Huh, did they tell you that? How do you know that?" I would point out like I don't actually have evidence for it. I was just worried but, yes, was definitely helpful. Number five on our list here is called The Unique List. This is to write down all of the things that are great, special, and unique about you without qualifying them. Without saying, "It could be better, but I think I'm okay at this," or "Maybe I'm not as good as so and so, but maybe I'm good at this."
Dedeker: Not as good as I used to be five years ago.
Jase: Right, any number of things. What's interesting about this exercise is, one, it can be surprisingly challenging to do, but take comfort in the fact that you're making this list not to show to anybody, right? You're not creating your dating profile or your résumé and putting these on there. Although maybe it's good practice for things you could put on those later, but it's just this list for yourself and to be aware of if you're writing something and you feel a little bit weirdly uncomfortable while you're writing it. That might be an indication there's something there. There actually might be a lot of truth to it. That's why you get that feeling of like, "I feel weird to even say this, could actually because it's so true."
Emily: We talked about this a little bit in Episode 388, the comparison episode. There was a worksheet that my therapist gave me on the strengths exploration. I think that would be if you're having a difficult time coming up in your head with things that you think that you're good at, that gives you a huge list of things, qualities, or whatever that you are good at. You can look on that and then celebrate all of the things that you're great at.
I'm saying that for myself too because it's difficult for me and it's difficult for all of us in a lot of ways, but it's good. It's a good reminder for sure. Number six is, "What's the opposite of this thought?" For this, you can identify a few primary thoughts that are swirling around in your brain. You can write out what the exact opposite of the thought might be and you can see what that brings up for you.
I like this one just because sometimes it's great to realize, "Hey, what I'm thinking is probably not a fact and it's probably not true and there are things out there." The exact opposite may actually be closer to what reality is in this moment. It's just a good reminder that your intrusive thoughts are not necessarily what's actually going on and that you can move past them.
Dedeker: I think the last time I did this, it was around something about the thought that's swirling around is, "Oh, my gosh, I'm never going to get as much time with my partner as I want and someone else is always going to get more time with them," and then the opposite thought being like, "I have plenty of time with my partner and they also share that time with other people." It was also more of a neutral thought as well. Again, in that moment, it's not like it's going to fix everything, but I think it could help just give a little bit of perspective.
Jase: For number seven, we have the emotion wheel. Back in Episode 348, we talked about the Plutchik emotion wheel. You can also just google that and you'll find it. Use an emotion wheel or some other tool like just lists of different emotion words to pick from to help you to pinpoint precisely what's coming up for you and then also ideally to keep track of that. Maybe you notice, "Okay, these are the emotions," or if it's an emotion wheel, you could see, "Okay, I'm very much on this side of the wheel," right? There's a lot of words over here.
Maybe even color-code them or something. Then the next time you're experiencing this, you could come back and say, "Huh, look, I'm still in this same part of the wheel over here," or maybe it's, "You know what? I'm actually feeling pretty different stuff. I'm calling it jealousy still, but it's actually a pretty different feeling." There's just ways to get information for yourself that can help you with determining, "What can I do about this," but also just can help you get to know yourself a little bit better, which in itself is a way of helping to regulate those emotions.
Emily: Number eight, I love this one, is a therapist dump. If you already have an established relationship with a therapist and you feel like they're supportive of you, you can reach out to them and you can talk to them about whatever it is that's going on. I think it's always a good idea to use the Triforce of Communication in moments like this because you may specifically be wanting something from them like advice or just coddling and appreciation and love and understanding and acceptance, and so potentially differentiate between the things that you want and let them know, "Hey, I need to talk about this to someone. I'm not looking for specific advice. I really just want to dump on you and I pay you to do that, so I'm going to. Thanks."
Dedeker: Tool number nine is chairwork. I learned about this from Martha Kauppi's book actually and I absolutely love this tool. I've used it myself many times since I first learned about it. The whole purpose of chairwork is to create a dialogue between conflicting parts of yourself. Let's say you've identified, there's one part of me that's totally freaked out and panicking, but then there's also another part of me that wants to be supportive and wants to be chill.
I'm like, "How do I deal with feeling both those things at once?" You can have those two parts of you get in dialogue together, have a conversation, and this can literally look like I'm going to set out two chairs. When I sit in this chair, I'm playing the part of my freaked-out self, talking to the supportive self. Then when I get in this chair, I'm the supportive self responding to that and making my own arguments, or if you don't want to act out a little melodrama for yourself, this could also be a journaling exercise as well.
What this does again is it helps to separate these things out. I think there could be a lot of insight in how these two parts of you talk to each other. You can recognize like, "Oh yes, actually, this freaked-out side of me maybe makes a good point over here," or "Oh, the supportive side also is making a good point." I think it can help with processing and helping you to get-- Really, you're getting those two conflicting parts of you at least a little bit more in sync.
Emily: I've been told to make a pros-and-cons list also in certain situations, and that's helpful too.
Jase: Yes. Actually, number 10 is a good tool for doing some of that. These are using CBT worksheets. CBT stands for cognitive behavioral therapy. If you just look up CBT worksheets online, you'll find there's a ton of them out there that are available to download for free as PDFs or just images that you can look at. They cover all sorts of different things. I'm just looking at a few that come up in my search right now. There's one called "Fact or Opinion." That's just about determining, "Is this thing a fact or an opinion?"
Going back to what we talked about before of trying to write about this subjectively or just things about exploring your worries, which is something that comes up a lot with jealousy, is it comes from a fear or a worry. This is a great way of having some prompts and some guides for how to work through figuring out, "What am I feeling," asking yourself some useful questions that have been put together specifically based on research, and looking at what are effective ways of breaking down these emotions and thinking about them. If you're someone who likes to think about them in that cognitive, intellectual sort of way, CBT worksheets are an awesome way to do that.
Dedeker: Related to that, there's a lot of wonderful workbooks out there. Specifically, Kathy Labriola has a jealousy workbook. Kitty Chambliss has a jealousy workbook. If you go and just google polyamory, jealousy workbook, those will probably be your first two hits. I think there's a couple of others. Again, if you're someone who does really well with structured exercises and really likes leaning into that cognitive side of things, it's a great place to start. Both of these workbooks have a ton of different exercises. You can write in them. It's just like your school days. I would highly recommend.
Emily: Number 12 is to distract and/or reward the inner toddler. Love this one. Maybe let yourself indulge with inappropriate limits for yourself, but that might include getting a glass of wine, even having a cigarette. I wouldn't do that, but maybe the two of you.
Dedeker: Well, if that's not what your inner toddler wants-
Emily: You're right. My inner toddler does it. I know. I shouldn't judge.
Dedeker: -some people's inner toddler wants a smoke sometimes.
Emily: I shouldn't judge, but wine, abso-fucking-lutely, or another alcoholic beverage of choice, a comfort movie, a comfort TV show, comfort food, even a new video game. I might also like, I don't know, buy something. That's something I would do. Exactly, yes. It's something along those lines.
Dedeker: Again, within limits, you are the one who's going to know if this is a maladaptive behavior for you, but also sometimes it's like you just spoil yourself a little bit in whatever way you can. If that's going to help switch off your brain and give you that little squirt of dopamine or serotonin, I'm all for it.
Jase: To be honest, even if, say, there's one of these things you're trying to stop doing like you're trying to stop smoking in those moments where you're feeling all this jealousy and panic come up, absolutely, that's when you're going to want it. Maybe rather than beating yourself up over that or just trying to white-knuckle it, it's like, "Let me treat myself to something else. Let me find some other way I can give myself a reward and give more of a positive, 'Here's something instead,'" right? Then number 13, this is a favorite of mine and this is--
Dedeker: I knew this was going to be a big, old tool for Jase.
Jase: Yes, and this is to pick a new skill to learn. In general, for me, I just love learning stuff, but I think there's something special in this case about learning a skill. This could take a lot of different forms. Learning a skill, it's not just like I'm getting knowledge, but I'm also getting something that I can apply, right? This could be something like knitting or crocheting or model-making or some kind of hands-on-type craft.
It could also be a skill of like, "I want to learn how to make 3D graphics. I'm going to download Blender, which is free, and watch some online tutorials and learn how to make 3D models on my computer," or "I'm going to, again, with Blender, learn how to make models that I can 3D print if I have a local makerspace or that I can order through a service like Shapeways online."
There's just something that excites you and that interests you. The whole point of it is that it's not just learning, but you're also trying to apply it right away. It's going to occupy more of your brain. You're going to be more focused on, "Okay, I really need to learn this to the point I can do it," not just to say, "Oh yes, I listened to The History of English Podcast. Now, I know a lot of history."
Dedeker: Well, related to that, pick up a crafting project or an art project in particular. Basically, a constructive activity that helps you get in the zone that will take up your focus, but ideally, also that's maybe calming or soothing for you. That can be either, again, something that you learn brand new or something that you've been doing for a long time. Again, finding something that helps you use your hands perhaps or just engage in a slightly different way.
Emily: Next one is one that I definitely could do more often, and that is to put your phone away or step away from social media and especially the news. The news can be really challenging, especially in certain moments of intensity and around the election times, for example, or if something really awful is happening in the news. It just can be really overwhelming at times. It's good to take a moment and step away from that. Unless you know which type of content legitimately comforts you such as animal videos or, for me, figure skating, that comforts me, or makeup TikTok, something along those lines. Otherwise, it's really good to take a break from social media and from the news from time to time for sure.
Jase: Even if you are going to go to TikTok or YouTube or something to not just go to your feed because that's going to be that mix. Part of the reason why news is not very healthy for us, especially when we're already in an upset emotional state, is because that's what gets you to pay attention to stuff. That's what's getting you to pay attention to your jealous thoughts right now to these thoughts of threat is because, as humans, we're attuned to focus on threats so that we can avoid them, and the news plays on that. It's just going to really drum up more of that type of feeling.
Even if it seems like, "Oh, well, that's different than what I'm jealous about," it's stirring up similar feelings of fear and worry and stress. It's just really not going to be good. If you're going to YouTube, for example, go to a specific channel that you know makes the type of videos that you're looking for, or if it's on TikTok, go to a specific account that you know makes fun, lighthearted things rather than just going through your feed because you don't know what's going to come up in there. Some of it might be upsetting and then you set yourself back.
Dedeker: Number 16, this is the last one in the tools for your brain section. This is all about sleeping. I know that if my partner or partners are occupied away on a date, sometimes even if I'm not having a hard time with it, even if I feel okay, I may still have trouble sleeping. I found that this happened for me both when I was living alone and also when I was used to having a partner in bed with me that it's quite normal.
If you're used to someone being there and then they're not there, that can be disturbing to your sleep, right? If you're just like emotionally upset, it can make it really hard to sleep. For myself, pretty consistently when I'm sleeping by myself now, I put on either some kind of sleep sounds. I'm a huge fan of the Sleep With Me podcast, which is just a guy telling some boring stories in a really relaxed and meandry and unintentionally funny kind of way.
I love it. It really does help soothe me enough and gives a little something for my brain to listen to. I think that's the important thing instead of just laying in bed just with my own thoughts and being all upset that I have something that I can listen to. Usually, in this case, it's like a weird meandry, dreamish kind of story. There's something there, but it's not so engaging that that's going to prevent me from being able to drift off to sleep.
Jase: It's like that perfect balance between just engaging enough, but not too engaging to keep you awake, right? It's like finding the podcast that does that for you. Before we go on to our tools for your body, which will be our second category for this episode, we're going to take a quick break to talk about some ways you can support this show.
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Dedeker: Hello, and we're back and we're going to be moving on to tools for your body. What I mean by tools for your body is that for some people, their experience of jealousy or intense emotion isn't necessarily in their head at all or it's only a little bit something they notice in their head or cognitively. Mostly, they notice it in their body. There are these physiological symptoms that show up.
That can be everything from your stomach feeling upset, a tightness in the chest, feeling like you want to cry, muscle tension or sometimes shaking, or feeling blood boiling. All kinds of physiological symptoms can come up. Part of this is because our bodies can sometimes rocket into survival mode, into fight, flight, freeze, fawn, and all of the weird physical symptoms that are associated with each of those responses, right?
These tools are meant to help alleviate some of that in your body and help to alleviate some of the physiological symptoms, or at least find a way to reframe them and understand them a little bit better. The first tool, tool number 17, is to sift through it. I think we talked about this back on the-- what was it? The Putting Feelings into Words episode if I'm remembering it correctly.
Jase: Right, yes, where we talked about the emotion wheel as well.
Dedeker: The emotion wheel, yes. This tool is a little bit of a bridge between the brain section and the body section. Sift, S-I-F-T, stands for sensation, image, feeling, and thought. The idea is that when you're having a lot of intense physical feelings come up, emotional feelings come up, you just go through this one by one. What are the sensations that I'm having? Let's clue into like, "What's actually physically happening in my body?"
Then we check in with what images are arising. Is there a particular nightmare vision popping off in your brain? Is there a bad memory from the past that's replaying in your brain? Feeling, which is about those emotions, right? You can circle back to maybe using that emotion wheel to get more curious about what feelings you may be experiencing or you can, again, just check in with your body of like, "Ooh, I think I'm feeling sad. How do I know that it's sadness? What does sadness feel like? Where does it show up in my body?"
Then the last one is thought, which, again, is more of like the cognitive stuff that we were talking about before but identifying, "What are the thoughts that I'm having? What's the value judgment that's coming out here? What's the meaning that I'm making?" Again, this one just bridges a lot of these together. I appreciate that it starts with sensation of first going to just that curiosity of what's actually happening in your body instead of just trying to run away from it first thing.
Jase: That's our instinct, right? It's just, "I want to numb this." Instead, it's like, "Let's understand it first." Yes, that's great. Number 18 is movement, so physical movement of some kind. This could be exercise, yoga, dance. It could be structured like doing a dance class or something or a yoga class or it could be unstructured of, "I'm just going to punch-dance it out in the living room or in a park or whatever," or maybe it's going for a run or even a walk.
Just let your body do what it's craving. Something to be aware of with this is if anger or aggression comes up or sometimes my body feels like it wants to throw this fan out the window or something, put some limits on it obviously and try to regulate that, but find like, "Okay, is there a way I could do that same gesture but without the fan in my hand," right? Let it out. Let yourself express that.
I've found for me, a few years ago, there was a really rough time where, for me, it was going and doing like really intense weight-lifting workout. That was the thing that would get me through it. I would end up feeling a lot better because it's like it wasn't violent movements, but you're really exerting yourself. That helped get out some of that energy that I was feeling when I was so upset.
Dedeker: I love the way that my therapist has put this, which is she says that when we're building a fire out in the woods like when we're camping, the first thing you do is you build a fire ring, right? It's the difference between I'm building a fire ring and then setting something on fire versus I'm just going to set things on fire indiscriminately, right? It's okay to explore that anger or aggression that's coming up in your body, but just find ways to contain it.
Emily: Number 19 is progressive relaxation. This is something that I've done in yoga or meditation. It's essentially tensing and relaxing different muscle groups at a time to encourage relaxation. You might start with your forehead or with your shoulders and work your way all throughout your body. You can definitely pay attention to places like your jaw or your neck or your belly.
Me, I hold a ton of tension in my jaw and I chew a lot at night. That's something that's a place that's going to be very tense a lot of the time and that I'll have tension in. There are a ton of progressive relaxation, meditations, and videos available online for free, so you can check those out. Sometimes you might be able to find them just auditorily as opposed to just in video, so you can check all of those out and try it for yourself.
Dedeker: Tool number 20 is orienting. The whole purpose of this tool is actually to get your brain back online. For some people, it's the opposite, right? Their brain is too active. The whole point of this is like if you are overwhelmed with physiological sensations, it's about getting that observer back online, that conscious observer back online. These can be like the classic tools like counting things, finding all the blue things in the room if that works for you. I like to go even simpler of just get curious about what's going on in the corners of my room.
This area that I probably don't ever specifically pay attention to. I'm going to look at all the corners of this room and just see what's going on or I'm going to see what is going on with my sense of smell. Just like right now in this moment, what can I smell? What can I hear? Again, it's just like trying to get your focus to be not totally subsumed by all these horrible feelings and physiological feelings that are coming up, but just orienting to what's actually happening in the present moment.
Jase: Then number 21 is self-touch or I would even just say touch experiences might be another way to say this because this could be a comforting touch of just like giving yourself a hug or rubbing your arms or something. It could be taking a bath and just relaxing and feeling being in the water. It could be getting a massage, but it also could be a pleasant sensory experience like having an orgasm or something like that, right? The whole point of it though is it's about getting in touch with your body in an experience that you're controlling and it's an enjoyable experience. It's trying to bring out that ability to have physical pleasure instead of just feeling locked down or those physical feelings of stress.
Emily: Along those lines, you can also get comforting touch from others. That might include things like platonic cuddling or cuddle groups or connecting with another partner. If you're feeling jealous about potentially a partner that is on a date at this potential moment in time, then you can go and talk to another partner or a group of friends or a cuddle group and get some loving touch from them.
Dedeker: If you go back and listen to Episode 361, that was our interview with John Howard, where I remember he talked about the power of letting someone hold you like a baby. It could be maybe you have another partner that you can go to and just ask them to hold you like a baby for a little while and see what that brings up, or maybe you can recruit a friend ahead of time-
Emily: -to hold you like a baby.
Dedeker: -who feels comfortable holding you in that way. I think that's another really good one. It puts you in a vulnerable position, but also a very supported and comforted position that can be one to play with as well.
Jase: Yes, that's fun. I like that. Number 23 is humming, singing, or OMing. There was a 2018 systematic review of studies on breathwork, so any kind of meditation or other practices involving controlling your breath. They found that humming in particular generates more nitric oxide, which sterilizes the air you breathe, increases your arterial oxygen, so the oxygen getting all the way out through your arteries and would reduce blood pressure. Specifically, humming has that effect. Also, it stimulates the vagus nerve, which helps to activate your parasympathetic nervous system.
Your sympathetic nervous system is the one that amps up for danger and your parasympathetic is the one that brings it back down. It helps to activate that. Then it also improves your heart rate variability. Basically, the ability to get your heart rate back down after it's been elevated, which is a measure of how well your body can move out of stress into a more relaxed state. This is one that Dedeker and I have taken to doing with each other. When one person is stressing about something or freaking out, the other person will come up and hold them and just go .
Dedeker: We kind of hum at each other.
Jase: We'll kind of hum at each other together. Just we're being goofy and silly about it, but it does help. There is actually some science to back up that that is a useful thing. You don't need a partner to do that with you, right? This is something that you can do all on your own.
Emily: I love OMing and yoga. It's great.
Dedeker: Yes, OMing's great. I put this in there because, years ago, my sister told me that what her doctor had told her was that singing for at least 20 minutes produces basically the same effects in the body as like taking an opiate.
Emily: Hell yes.
Dedeker: Now, I couldn't find any specific studies that was like one-to-one check, right?
Emily: No wonder I love karaoke so much.
Dedeker: I couldn't fully fact-check that.
Jase: There you go.
Dedeker: That's right. Well, there is something like singing and singing together with other people. Also, there is an evidence to suggest that it helps increase our sense of well-being probably because, like humming or OMing, there's that vibratory experience that vibrates against the vagus nerve and just helps us to feel more calm. You can hack that, baby. Speaking of other hacks for your body, put an ice pack on your neck. Have you heard of this one before?
Emily: That sounds cold.
Dedeker: Well, it is cold.
Jase: I have not heard of it for stress for that thing.
Dedeker: Okay, so there was a pretty small study, a 2018 study published in JMIR Formative Research. By small, I mean I think there was like 60-ish participants or something, but they found that cold stimulation specifically to the lateral neck area, so like the sides of your neck, they found that that increased heart rate variability and also lowered blood pressure. Then in the study, it was only for 16 seconds. It wasn't like put an ice pack on your neck for 10 minutes.
It was pretty short. There was still pretty significant effects. There's a lot of theories about why this is again related to the vagus nerve or related to the diving reflex, but you don't have to understand all of that. All you have to know is that this can be something that can potentially be a quick hack, I suppose, of helping to bring your body a little bit closer to a sense of goodness and well-being.
Emily: An ice hack, cool.
Dedeker: An ice hack.
Emily: Number 25, pet an animal, yes. I love this so much. There is little better when you're feeling off or bad or just overwhelmed than a cat or a dog or someone jumping into your lap, some creature, and loving on you and getting to pet that animal. It is like taking your overwhelm and putting it outside of yourself a bit, or caring or just making another being feel good, I think. It, in turn, also makes you feel good. There's a lot of studies on this and it's just great overall.
Jase: Then number 26, our last one for this category, is to find a way to laugh. I was actually just reading an article a couple of days ago talking about the researchers who've been studying the science of laughter and why we do it as humans and what it's all about. One of the things that they have found and that's come up in a lot of the research is that laughter is a way that we indicate things are safe. If you think about that situation of we're startled by something or we're scared for a moment, and then we realize what it is and that something silly would happen and we laugh about it. That laughter is not just for ourselves but also to signal the other humans around us, "Don't worry. Everything's okay."
Dedeker: Do you think that's where nervous laughter comes from or awkward laughter that it's like this impulse to be like, "Oh, I have to make this okay"?
Jase: Right, yes. I think it must be related, but that is an interesting question. If we have any laughter researchers out there, hit us up. We'll do a whole episode talking about that. Finding a way to laugh, right? If you've got particular movies or shows or podcasts or something that consistently make you laugh, I know it can be hard to feel like laughing when you're stressed out. You may find once you start getting into that content, you might let yourself laugh anyway. That will then create a feedback loop, getting you to feeling more safe and more okay.
Dedeker: There's also a laughter yoga. Have you heard of that?
Emily: No.
Jase: I have.
Emily: What is that?
Jase: I've never done it or seen it, but I have heard of this.
Dedeker: Oh yes, it's a whole thing. My understanding of the way that it works is that-- I don't know. It's this weird, funny thing where it's all about just people laughing, right? I think the way that it tends to start out is it starts out with a leader obviously fake laughing, right? Just like producing a laugh and that's how you encourage people. You got to produce the laugh first and then I think that's like the absurdity of it kicks in. Then people start laughing at the absurdity and then laughing at the way that your laugh sounds. Then the snowball has gathered enough momentum that they were genuinely laughing and getting the benefits that come along with laughter.
Jase: That makes sense. If we're signaling as a group, "Hey, everything's safe now," that there could be a lot of benefit to doing that in a group as well. That's really interesting. Wow, I'd like to go try that sometime and see how it is.
Dedeker: Okay, folks, so we are going to hit pause here for today. In our second part of this episode, next week is when we're going to be getting into tools for your relationships and tools for your heart and soul as well. We're going to be throwing up a question on our Instagram Stories this week. We want to hear from you. When you feel jealous, do you feel it more in your brain or in your body?