Coffee Chats w/ Dr. D

Hello, Cadre. I'm hoping this mic is working because I noticed last time the sound wasn't the best. And I checked this little mic right here, and it was plugged in and everything. So I don't know what happened. So hopefully it's working today and hopefully you can hear me. Okay. Because I spent too much money on this mic for it not to work. Okay. And I do have my coffee today. It's just black. I'm gonna try not to spill it because I'm wearing white. There you go. So as you are joining, or if you're watching the replay, let me know what is in your cup today.

So what you got drinking today? I got. It's actually a caramel coffee, but it's black. I don't have any creamer. I am in my office space, which I now have to myself, which I'm really proud of. And so the person that was here before me had the. The little mini fridge. And so I don't have a mini fridge to keep my creamer in there just yet, but I'm gonna get one. So I am kicking off. Oh, Dr. Pepper. I love Dr. Pepper. Let me tell you a quick story about that. So when I was in high school, I was a cheerleader and we had a Dairy Queen across the street.

And so our thing that we would do after school before practice is we would get a Dr. Pepper and fries and a milkshake. I know it sounds disgusting, like putting that all together, but that was our thing. But I love me some Dr. Pepper, but I am kicking off the month. Our theme with Cadre this month is freedom. And if you saw my post, I do have some scheduled content, so I wanted to plan it out a little better this month. And so we're going to start this week with talking about the freedom to feel.

And I want you to think about anytime that you've been in a relationship. And if you're not in a romantic relationship, it could have been with a friend or someone very close to you. So any intimate relationship, and I want you to think about times where you were told what you shouldn't be feeling. So maybe you were experiencing an uncomfortable feeling and you brought it to that person's attention. Or maybe you were talking about the situation and you were told how you shouldn't feel about it, you shouldn't feel that way, you shouldn't be upset, you shouldn't do this.

And what does that feel like? Now, I also want you to think about how often you recognize your own emotions, but you tell yourself that you shouldn't feel that way. So I like to come from this emotion focus therapy background, and that's primarily what I use with clients. But I always think about emotions as just signals. They are signals telling us what needs to be paid attention to in the moment. So even right now, I want you to scan yourself from head to toe and just think about, what are you physically feeling right now?

So not naming the emotion exactly, but what do you feel in your body? Some people might instantly notice something, like in their chest or in their gut, or maybe there's tingling in their fingers. Maybe you have a headache. Sometimes I get, like, tension right here. Or maybe you notice because you're paying attention to your body that you've got some tightness. And so I want you to remember what you're feeling in your body, and maybe we can put a name to it later. But I have a couple of questions for you I want you to think about.

So with emotions, sometimes if you are in maybe bad situations in a relationship, sometimes our emotions are just mirrors to the pain that we've experienced before, and sometimes that comes from our childhood as well. So if you think about a mirror, it's just a reflection. And so when we feel something, we are taking a moment to really acknowledge what something has been hurting in the past. Right. Maybe someone hurt you with something they said, something they did. Maybe it's something that you did and you regret, and now it's starting to resurface in the current connection that you're in.

And so think about that. If our emotions can be mirrors to places in our lives that are unhealed, why is that? Why is that emotion coming up? It's a signal. It's something for you to pay attention to. Okay. And also think about. I have notes here, y' all. That's why I'm looking over what are some common emotions that you feel in an intimate relationship? And intimacy is not just romantic. I always talk about about friendships. Friendships might be one of our more intimate relationships that we have.

And sometimes with family, we don't feel necessarily connected to our family. So friendships, I think, are maybe the most intimate space that we can think of. But what emotions do you recognize about yourself in intimate connections? So maybe you feel anger at times, Maybe you feel fear or loneliness. Even in intimate relationships, maybe there's sadness, but on the positive side, so if we flip the coin, maybe there are moments where you are happy or you're excited, or you feel calm with the person that you're with.

And so those are also positive things, positive signals. That we need to pay attention to. You know, you might hear videos about paying attention to the energy that people are giving. And what energy are you giving? Or matching someone's energy. Right. Those are emotions that we're talking about. Matching someone's energy is matching their emotions. And I like to think that emotions can transfer. So think about times when you have been in the same room with someone that's just smiling all the time, and they're just really happy.

And. And when I think about that, I don't know why, but y' all know I love my coffee. I used to be a Starbucks girl trying to give it up. But I do remember when I was really busy and always on the go in the car, I would always go to Starbucks in the morning, and the person on the intercom was, like, super animated. And I'm like, why are you so happy this early in the morning? But when I saw that person at the window to get my coffee, he. She made me smile because she had so much positive energy coming from her.

And the same is true when there's a negative emotion. So if you've ever been in the room with someone who's angry or maybe you've experienced someone's anger where you're the victim of their anger, sometimes that can make us upset, too, and so it just kind of feeds. So we do match each other's energy. But I want you to think about times when you've been told you you shouldn't feel that way, or if someone's upset with you and you get upset in defense and you're told you shouldn't feel like that. Right.

We have freedom to feel. We have freedom to recognize our emotions because they're just signals, and we all have them. And we all have, I think, common emotional experiences, but maybe for different reasons. Okay, so think about this. What happens if we choose to ignore our emotions, if we choose to ignore how we're feeling? Well, if this has ever come up in an intimate relationship, you might experience resentment. Why? Because you're probably not paying attention to how you feel. You're probably stuffing it.

And it's likely that you don't tell the person that's hurting you that they hurt you. So. So there's resentment there, and they have no idea that you're feeling a certain way because of something that they did. So when we choose to ignore how we feel, we just keep on going and we silence ourselves. We can get into this space where we create disconnection in an intimate relationship. I think another part of that is that we just don't speak up, right? We don't speak up because sometimes when we recognize what we feel and we do start talking, maybe you're like me, like, if I'm starting to talk about what's hurting me, I start crying.

I think it's just a natural physical response I have to the emotions I feel, but I'll start tearing up, and I don't want people to see me like that. And so I'll choose to stay quiet or I'll choose to just kind of talk about whatever's bothering me, like just talking, you know, to myself or I pray about it. But sometimes I just don't tell the person that hurt me because I don't want them to see me crying. And that feels weak and vulnerable. And we don't want to be vulnerable because that is a way of attack.

And so we might choose to just silence ourselves and not speak up when we're feeling something. But the other part of what happens when we ignore our feelings is we don't get what we need because we didn't speak up. So if we are hurting and we need to tell the person that's hurting us, hey, you did this and I felt this, or you said this and I started to feel this, and now I want to do this, right? We can't explain ourselves when we're experiencing certain emotions, then we can't get what we need.

We can't tell that person how to change for us. And that person will never know what they're doing, and they'll continue to hurt us, and they have no idea. But all of this is absolutely toxic, okay? And so when we choose to ignore our feelings, when we don't give ourselves the freedom to feel, we might end up staying in toxicity. It's all toxic. So ignoring our feelings, not saying how we feel, not saying what we need when we're hurting, it's toxic. Just calling it out for you. So if you're doing that, stop it.

So here's your challenge. I like to leave you with something to think about, something you can do this week. And I know the holiday is coming up, we might be around family, or maybe you have some date plans, I don't know. But your challenge is three things. One, when you start to feel something, be still. Just be still. Feel the feelings. Recognize where is it in your body. Describe how it feels. Right? Very basic stuff here, but we don't do it. So even right now, in this moment, as we're talking, we're having our little coffee chat today, stop and pause and recognize what are you feeling?

And if you can name your emotion, go ahead and put it in the chat. Now, for me, right now, I'm hungry. I am ready to eat something because it's lunchtime here. But I also feel excitement. And where do I feel that in my body? I notice I have, like, racing heart, and my heart is beating fast. I can feel it right here in my chest. I can feel energy, like, in my jawline. I can feel energy in my eyes. And so I know that. That those physical responses are in response to the emotion of excitement. So what are you feeling right now?

What are you feeling in your body? If you can even just name, Like, I feel tension. I feel tightness. I feel tingling. Whatever that thing is, go ahead and drop that in the chat. And the other part of your challenge, so we're going to be still. We're going to recognize how we're feeling. We're going to name it. But then when it's safe, when it's physically safe and emotionally safe, I want you to share that feeling with the person that you're in the room with or the person that maybe you walked away from because you were trying to hide how you feel.

Okay? So you feel hungry. Look, it's time to eat. This coffee ain't kicking it today. Brittany, thank you for joining. So you feel relieved that you're able to hop on and see me? Thank you. So that's all I got for y' all today. I want to thank you all for joining me for this chat, and I don't have my next topic for next week, but if you look at my post in Cadre, or if you look at my Instagram account, therealdoctor Leslie, it is posted there. And so make sure you join me, because all this month, like I said, we're going to be talking about freedom, freedom in relationships and different ways how we can experience that.

But we're starting with how do we feel? All right, you guys have a wonderful day. Go get your coffee, fill it up, and if it's too hot where you are, because it is steaming over here in Illinois, get some iced coffee. All right, bye.