Expectation Hangover

by Christine Hassler

  When I worked with Julie, the very first thing we did was to create a self-care plan to treat the physical symptoms of her Expectation Hangover immediately. A self-care plan, which you will learn to create for yourself later in this chapter, is a specific list of the behaviors you will modify, stop, or implement in your life. Julie stepped into the role of the Scientist and moved into neutral observation of herself. She then put her lab coat on and created a self-care plan that she hypothesized would treat her very pressing symptoms. Her self-care plan included exercising for at least one hour three days a week; sleeping a minimum of seven hours a night; cutting back to only one cup of coffee per day; turning off her phone at least two hours before bed; and meditating at least five minutes per day. After implementing this plan for only two weeks, Julie immediately began to feel better. Her theories proved true! She had more energy, her headaches and stomachaches went away, and her overall mind-set shifted. As she took care of her basic needs, she actually found her job less stressful. She saw she was using the job as an excuse to not take care of herself (which had also been a pattern in previous jobs). With her clearer state of mind, she became better at communicating with coworkers and setting boundaries with her boss.

  KAREN’S STORY

  At fifty-seven years old I was permanently disabled after a workplace injury, and my company decided they would not accommodate me. So I found myself unable to work in my profession of thirty years. In one day everything changed. Not what I expected! I had no idea how to plan from one day to the next. Food was my only friend, it seemed, as I sat at home and waited to hear if I had a job. My professional identity was gone. I spent my days, when I wasn’t at medical appointments, playing computer games, withdrawing from myself so I didn’t have to think about what was happening or how bad I felt. One day I got a glimpse of myself in the mirror sitting in front of the computer with a bag of chips next to me and did not even recognize myself. I saw my so-called coping strategies were only making my hangover worse and realized that even if I did not have control over my job, I did have control over how I coped.

  Now I’ve joined Weight Watchers and begun a water-based exercise program, and I reach out to friends to stop isolating myself. I’ve also joined a semiprofessional choir, started a writing group, and begun volunteering, all of which help feed my soul in a much healthier (and lower-calorie) way than the food did. My Expectation Hangover taught me that my profession is not who I am. Nor are my medical diagnoses. It is teaching me to listen to my body and my inner voice to learn what they need. I’m learning to love myself, take excellent care of myself, speak my truth, ask for what I need, and be the best me I can be.

  Something to be aware of as you observe and investigate your self-care is that we are all prone to addictive behavior, and it comes out the most during an Expectation Hangover. Why? Because we are on the prowl for anything to make us feel better and less uncertain. Addictions are there for us when it feels as if no one else is. Do you know what your addictions are? Some of us have several. Mine has been watching TV, which I do not do on a regular basis. I knew that I was avoiding truly dealing with an Expectation Hangover when I found myself in a pattern of getting totally hooked to a series and spending two or three hours per day watching television. It was my way of zoning out, numbing, and escaping from the reality of my life. Although I temporarily felt better when watching TV, I felt even more hungover the next day, which was an added dose of guilt. Guilt happens when we feel ashamed of our actions, when we know that what we are doing isn’t good for us but we do it anyway. When any behavior feels out of balance, admit to yourself that it is addictive.

  Addictions of all kinds — to substances, fears, self-doubts, material comforts, work, food, relationships, sex — give us a false sense of freedom. For a moment the high or distraction we get from an addiction feels liberating because it frees us from the symptoms of our Expectation Hangover. However, the freedom we experience from addictive behavior is like a mirage. Compulsive behavior imprisons us because we consistently find ourselves needing it in order to experience what we long for. Only aligning our actions to what truly feeds our body, mind, heart, and spirit offers true liberation.

  “I have learned that my coping mechanism is to bury myself in work. I now take Sundays off. Period. I need that day of rest. (God was onto something there.) While one day off a week may not be the typical ‘American Dream,’ it is just right for me. And I stick to that. I turn down clients and gigs on Sundays. I take a day to rest, regroup, rejuvenate. I am truly a happier, more productive person because of it. I also say no to work that isn’t right for me. I don’t take a job just to have a job.”

  — Nicole

  Recognize your addictive behavior, but don’t beat yourself up for it. When you feel the urge to shop, eat, drink, watch TV, or indulge in whatever your “drug” of choice may be, sit with the feeling instead. Call upon your Surfer to ride the wave of whatever feeling is coming up and feel it instead of numbing it. Remember that emotion (e-motion) is energy in motion, so get that energy moving in healthy ways. Breathe. Write. Dance. Paint. Meditate. Call a friend or sponsor. If you interrupt a behavior pattern consistently, it will dissolve; but you also have to introduce new, healthy behaviors. You must choose a different action. Even if it’s hard. Even if it doesn’t feel as good. And even if you don’t think you can do it. You can.

  Relationships are another important part of self-care. Reaching out for support is an investment in our overall well-being. In chapter 3 we saw that “being strong” is a coping strategy that can be ineffective. Trying to push through everything on your own is exhausting. No awards are given out for being fiercely independent. Asking for help is often the strongest thing you can do. Conversely, there are some boundaries you need to set and hold yourself to when dealing with others. Saying no to someone else’s expectations of you can be a way of saying yes to yourself. Remember, your job is to take care of yourself, and setting healthy boundaries with others is an act of self-love.

  You can choose what you put in your body, how you move your body, the degree to which you allow your body to rest and recover, and how you invest your time. You owe this to yourself; and I assure you that loving discipline will not only alleviate the symptoms of your Expectation Hangover, but also help you lay the foundation for a healthy lifestyle.

  “Take care of your body. It’s the only place you have to live.”

  — Jim Rohn

  EXERCISE

  Self-Care Plan

  In this exercise you will use the role-playing Rx of the Scientist to gather data about your current level of self-care and modify your behavior to improve your well-being. You will draw upon both the creative and analytical qualities of the Scientist to create a comprehensive self-care plan for behaviors you need to eliminate, modify, or add.

  1.Take a sheet of paper and turn it so it stretches longer horizontally than vertically. Draw three columns and label them “Eliminate,” “Modify,” and “Add.”

  2.In the “Eliminate” column write the behaviors you are committing to stopping completely.

  3.In the “Modify” column list the behaviors you will modify, and state specifically how you intend to adjust them.

  4.In the “Add” column apply some real TLC and prescribe yourself behaviors that will nourish your body, mind, and spirit.

  5.Observe and take responsibility for any addictive behaviors before they get worse. Remember to pay special attention to your relationship with yourself as well as your relationships with others. Are there conversations you need to have or boundaries you need to set with specific people? Is there an ex to stop stalking on Facebook?

  To get your scientific juices flowing, below are some examples from a client’s self-care prescription plan. This client was experiencing depression, laziness, lack of sleep, and loneliness while engaging in coping strategies like overworking, overeating, and turning to alcohol and men for comfort.

  Listening to Your Body

  “You have the
power to heal your life, and you need to know that. We think so often that we are helpless, but we’re not.”

  — Louise Hay

  During an Expectation Hangover be aware of messages your body may be sending you. Often the physical symptoms or conditions that arise are the body’s way of sounding an alarm, making self-care even more urgent.

  SAM’S STORY

  I was working at a top magazine in New York. At first, I loved my job because it was a constant adrenaline high. The stories, the people, and the money were so exciting. Plus, being the youngest person at the company was great for my ego! But about a year into the job, I began to get lower-back pain. The pain went from dull to severe pretty quickly. I did everything I could to relieve it, from yoga, to doctors, to getting a different chair, to icing or heating, but the pain kept getting worse and affected my ability to work. Saying no to awesome assignments led to a massive Expectation Hangover. Why was my back hurting so much? I did not expect to be dealing with chronic pain in my twenties during what felt like the height of my career.

  It turns out my body was talking to me, and because the pain became too much to bear, I listened. I began writing out a dialogue between me and my back. What I discovered through this process is that my back was alerting me that the pace of my job was out of sync with my own natural rhythm. It was too intense, and I was sitting at a desk way too much. I was so enamored with the glitz and glamour that I had neglected my desire to travel, move, and connect more deeply with people. This information was empowering and infuriating at the same time. I had worked so hard to get where I was — how could I leave? I kept feeling like I was supposed to be somewhere else even though a big part of me did not want to be. But the more I denied the truth, the louder the pain got. So I chose self-care by listening to my body and resigning from my job. A week after I left, I bought a one-way ticket to Southeast Asia and have been here ever since, working for various nonprofits and nurturing my creative passion for photography. My pace is peaceful; I am content. There is absolutely no glitz and glamour here; however, there is also absolutely no back pain.

  Our body is a marvelous feedback mechanism and can give us a tremendous amount of guidance during an Expectation Hangover if we are willing to listen. During the height of my Expectation Hangover about my marriage, my hair began falling out so much that I was running to specialists to try to find out how I could get it to stop. Using the journaling technique of dialoguing with the pain or symptom I was experiencing, I began to write questions to my body like “What is the message you are sending?,” “What do you need?,” and “How can I respond to you in a healing way?” I asked these questions one at a time and allowed my body to respond by tuning in to my own inner knowing.

  I learned that my body was attempting make me aware of how the stress over my untreated Expectation Hangover was affecting me physically. The fear of losing my marriage was manifesting in hair loss. Instead of making a choice about whether or not to stay married, I was stuck in my attempt to solve my hair-loss problem. And that was just one of my distractions! I was also depleting myself by continuing to work, work out hard, fill my schedule, and travel, during a time when I really needed to nourish myself and make a choice. My self-care prescription included gentle yoga classes rather than boot camps; journaling at night to honor my feelings rather than zoning out to television to suppress them; eliminating all alcohol; increasing my intake of green juice; and eating organic, cooked food rather than salads so even my digestion could get a bit of a break. I filled my schedule with things that were replenishing, like time with friends and bodywork treatments, instead of networking events and work projects.

  Consider what you can learn from the physical symptoms of your Expectation Hangover. The body doesn’t lie, and often there is an action we need to take to cure our physical symptoms. What messages is your body sending you? What self-care actions would help eliminate your symptoms rather than just temporarily relieving them?

  Tending to very basic physical needs helps us relax so that we are more fully equipped to continue making the shifts our Expectation Hangovers are inviting us to make. Following my self-care plan gave me the strength to face the discontent I was feeling and deal with the reality that my marriage was coming to an end. And when we finally made the choice to end the marriage, the hair loss stopped completely.

  TOOL

  Observation Journal

  “Self-observation brings man to the realization of the necessity of self-change. And in observing himself a man notices that self-observation itself brings about certain changes in his inner processes. He begins to understand that self-observation is an instrument of self-change, a means of awakening.”

  — George Gurdjieff

  Have you ever been to a zoo where they have gorillas? People always crowd around to watch them, and usually there are a few scientists observing their behavior — charting and documenting every move. I want you to imagine that there is a gorilla part of you (a really cute gorilla of course) and a scientist part of you. The gorilla part is the part of you that unconsciously moves through your day, prompted by the old programming of your expectations. The scientist part of you is the part that witnesses the behavior of the gorilla.

  Before a scientist formulates a hypothesis, he collects data through observation. To document your behavior so you can study it effectively, start an observation journal that you will keep for at least one week. Get a separate notebook for this purpose. As you go through the motions of your day, be aware of the part of you that is behaving (gorilla) and the part of you that is observing your behavior (scientist). To practice this right now, become aware of the part of you that is reading this book. Next, in your mind’s eye, bring your awareness about six feet outside and slightly above your body and witness yourself reading this book. Notice this dual awareness of yourself as both the observer and the subject of study.

  Throughout the day, and especially before you go to bed, put on your lab coat and document your behavior by writing it down. The purpose of your observation journal is to study your behavior by examining what actions you took and did not take, what choices you made, and how you reacted to situations that arose. Note the word choice, self-talk, repetitive thoughts, and emotional states that go along with certain behaviors. You do not have to write down every little thing, but be reasonably thorough.

  Kate thought that becoming the vice president of a movie studio at thirty-one would bring her happiness and make her dad proud. Instead, she found herself with new problems: increased responsibility, stress, and a huge Expectation Hangover about the fact that the big title did not come with the big feeling of happiness or worthiness she’d expected. Her friend called her a “workaholic.” At first, Kate denied that label, but she could not deny that something felt true about it; so she decided to investigate. By completing her observation journal, Kate noticed and tracked behavior that was reinforcing her Expectation Hangover. She noticed she talked a lot about how stressed-out she was and the next step instead of just appreciating where she was. Kate also realized she had started to leave behind her feminine virtues to “keep up” with all the men around her. She was living in a horror story of her own creation because of all the pressure she put on herself. Hard-driving self-talk was incessant, and enough was never enough. Kate passed over compliments without ever taking them in. She said no to social invitations and stopped going to the gym to stay at work later or get to the office earlier.

  By taking a step back from her behavior and observing it through the lens of the Scientist, she came to a realization she described this way: “I was indeed a workaholic and was consistently making choices that moved me forward in my career at the cost of my well-being and relationships.” Once she understood her behavior was the cause of her suffering, she saw she could be the cause of her own happiness by investigating and altering her behavior. (A little later in this chapter, you’ll hear about the drastic changes Kate made in her life.)

  EXERCISE

  Collec
ting Data and Formulating Your Hypotheses

  Take a week’s break from reading this book so you can go into full research mode. Spend seven days as the Scientist and observe your own behavior; record your observations in your observation journal. When the week is complete, come back to this exercise and respond to the following questions in your regular journal.

  1.What am I doing, or not doing, that is making the symptoms of my Expectation Hangover worse?

  2.What actions or choices have I been engaging in or making repeatedly while expecting a result different from the one I keep getting?

  3.What is my self-talk like?

  4.How am I talking about myself and my life with others? What are most of my conversations about?

  5.Did I take actions that moved me out of my comfort zone?

  6.If I attained a goal or achieved a result, how did it feel?

  7.To what degree have I been following my self-care plan?

  8.What did I do that was reactive?

  9.What did I do that was proactive?

  As the Scientist, begin to formulate hypotheses regarding the most appropriate steps to take to alter your behavior and establish healthier, more productive habits, based on the data you collected. Right now you are just investigating. You will not know if change occurs until you test your hypotheses. Use the following prompts to formulate hypotheses about your Expectation Hangover:

  If I stop doing…, then…(Complete as many of these as possible.)

  If I start doing…, then…(Complete as many of these as possible.)

  If I start talking about…rather than…, then…

  My comfort zone is…, and a step I could take out of it is…

  Now go out and begin testing your hypotheses to determine what behaviors move you out of your Expectation Hangover. Based on your results, continue to collect data in your observation journal, and formulate updated hypotheses that you then test. This process is not just scientific; it’s also empowering! You will see how even the slightest changes in your behavior can create significant positive shifts in your life.