Narrating Hope

Join Elizabeth for this third episode in the Well-Being in the Workplace series which is all about meaning. We are meaning making people, yet what does that mean for the workplace? What if your job is not your dream job? What does listening to that longing for meaning look like in your life? What if what is most meaningful is outside of work? What might it look like to move towards more meaning even in small ways?

Join Elizabeth for the second part of the Well-Being in the Workplace series. This episode highlights the need for recovery between stressors to help prevent chronic stress. Elizabeth encourages elevating both rest and play as ways to come down from high alert, access rejuvenation, and work in a more sustainable way.

Join Elizabeth in this series on well-being in the workplace. Working hours make up a lot of someone's life and time. How someone feels at work matters and can greatly impact well-being. Listen in to this first conversation that highlights relationships as being of utmost importance in the work setting. If someone feels valued, connected, and respected in their work setting, it has great impact on how they feel. Elizabeth theorizes that it may lead to more sustainable productivity in the work setting versus someone operating under the threat of criticism and dynamics of disrespect.

Listen in to this conversation with Elizabeth about navigating uncertainty and mitigating anxiety by challenging catastrophic script writing. Instead, ground yourself in what you know to be true, which helps you live in the present and consider how to be wise for the future instead of so fearful.

Join Elizabeth in this reflective episode that encourages practicing re-setting often instead of viewing the re-set opportunity as solely tied to New Year resolutions. Re-setting is a practice that embodies grace as we move towards what we value the most over and over again despite various setbacks.

Listen in to this conversation with Elizabeth focused on improving relationships by reducing the destructive dynamic of growing resentment. When we can become more aware of any resentment we are experiencing, we can then work to address it so that our inner and outer lives align more. By voicing boundaries--saying yes when we mean it and no when we need to set a limit-resentment is often reduced and relationships enhanced.

Many times as we are busy and doing life, the first thing to go is taking good care of ourselves. Elizabeth encourages listeners to take care of themselves well by cultivating a practice of checking in with themselves. This kind of attunement includes checking in with your body as well as emotions and thoughts. Asking yourself "what do you need?" is that next step as it positions someone to take small steps to meet their needs and care for themselves well.

Elizabeth encourages listeners to give themselves permission not do everything during the holidays as well as permission not to be picture perfect. Instead, Elizabeth urges giving yourself permission to enjoy the season and prioritize meaning making. This involves saying no at times through boundary work, so that yeses are more whole-hearted. In this way, boundaries can go hand in hand with enjoying the holidays so much more.

As the holidays approach, they can often carry with them the potential for a great deal of stress and overwhelm, and yet this dynamic can often be influenced to feel so much lighter by prioritizing what is most meaningful during the holidays and then intentionally laying down the rest or at least accepting a "good enough" stance. This frees someone to focus on and enjoy what is most important to them instead of expecting themselves to equally attend to all things--even things that are not as important.

Can you relate to the concept of a guilty feeling and narrative that seems to follow you around, wherever you go, even when you are not doing something wrong? In this episode, Elizabeth encourages listeners to distinguish between guilt showing up as a conviction when not living in alignment with values versus this ever-present, constant weighty narrative that accuses and condemns when it's actually not even relevant, true, or helpful.

In this episode, Elizabeth shares about overidentification from Dr. Kristin Neff's research about self-compassion. Elizabeth encourages growing in self-awareness of any thought patterns where overidentification shows up, which is often big generalizations about what things mean and instead moving towards simply noticing and naming without so much judgment. This mindful approach helps promote self-compassion which impacts so many things, but especially our relationships with ourselves.

In this episode, Elizabeth emphasizes that we are in lifelong relationships with ourselves and how often we do not treat ourselves with the tenderness, care, and encouragement that we would treat a good friend. Elizabeth guides listeners towards asking yourself what you need as well as talking to yourself with more encouragement and kindness.

In this episode, Elizabeth encourages listeners about the goodness of boundaries--emphasizing that boundaries are healthy, not mean, and lead to more whole-hearted yeses, which then impacts there being less resentment in relationships and in general. Elizabeth encourages the naming of values and the consideration of priorities for the season that you are in. By examining these two things, it can become more clear what your yeses are and where you need to say no.

In this episode Elizabeth Burton encourages listeners to really consider their own patterns as well as the patterns in their relationships. This takes reflection and some degree of self-awareness. When you are honest with yourself about naming the patterns, you are more in a position to possibly grow through them and to help create healthier dynamics with yourself and in your relationships.

In this episode, Elizabeth Burton encourages movement towards a healthier body image by increasing awareness of all or nothing, highly critical, and rigid thought patterns. The good news is that we can work to cultivate and build a healthier view of bodies by intentionally shifting our thoughts towards more acceptance and more sustainable thoughts and choices.. This is relevant for adults listening in terms of their own body image and also for any parents listening to consider how they can model a healthy body image for their kids.

Anxiety often provokes developing coping strategies that are avoidant in nature. In this episode Elizabeth encourages challenging avoidance when it is not serving you. As people, we generally grow through facing hard things. When we become less avoidant and face what is anxiety provoking, we may find that the anxiety shift and become less powerful.

In this episode, Elizabeth encourages listeners to acknowledge and name their limits. This moves someone towards self-compassion and sustainability instead of expecting themselves to be rigidly perfect and continuously feeling shame and the loud voice of a noisy inner critic. Naming and embracing limits looks like someone acknowledging what they need, giving themselves permission to rest, recover, and accept "good enough" in accordance with their values.

In this episode, Elizabeth Burton encourages listeners to practice self-awareness of their thoughts and notice when thinking is all or nothing. Typically all or nothing thinking is problematic and an cause challenges both in someone's life and in their relationships. When we can move away from all or nothing thinking, we can make more room to name the both/and, see the complexity, and ground ourselves in a more true narrative.

Elizabeth encourages listeners to intentionally slow down amidst the harried pace and rush of life to claim some time to get quiet and get reflective. This posture of reflection leads to greater attunement in that someone can check in with themselves by noticing what they are feeling, what they are thinking, how they are doing in their body, and what they need. Reflection leads to noticing what's going well in relationships and whether someone is living in alignment with their values or if something needs to change. Being more intentional with reflection helps break cycles of auto-pilot and inspires more intentional doing.

Elizabeth encourages caregivers towards sustainable caregiving by noticing what they need in order to keep pouring out. Elizabeth challenges the idea that taking care of oneself is selfish and empowers caregivers to practice caring for others with attunement to their own needs as well. This involves permission to rest and be rejuvenated and building a support network for the hard work, yet meaningful work of caring for another person.

In this episode, Elizabeth encourages listeners to consider the season that they are in. Just as we do with literal seasons, name the season and consider what you need in order to walk through the season. For example, if in a season of grief, name and validate that for yourself, and then consider what you need to walk through that time.

Elizabeth encourages listeners to practice assertive communication by emphasizing the goodness of assertive communication and the letting go of passive and aggressive communication styles. Assertive communication has so many benefits for self-worth, for strengthening relationships, and for helping mitigate anxiety as it elevates having a voice and being able to speak into your own life. This is relevant for adults as well as older kids, teenagers, and young adults.

In this episode Elizabeth talks about all anxiety. First simply normalizing anxiety as a human emotion and encouraging listeners to notice and name when they are experiencing anxiety. Elizabeth then focuses on the strategy of considering anxiety as having a voice and beginning to pay attention to what anxiety is saying in your life. Sometimes anxiety is telling us to avoid things that are actually good and healthy for us because they are uncomfortable and scary, but by externalizing anxiety's voice, we reduce it's power in our lives.

Elizabeth encourages listeners to consider whether they have margin in their lives. Margin can be thought of as "breathing room" and is an essential part of well-being. Margin allows for rest and recovery and supports playfulness and delight. Elizabeth asks listeners to get reflective on whether they desire more margin in their lives and then work to cultivate it by saying no to extra things in order to cultivate more intentional margin.

Elizabeth shares about the overfunctioning dynamic and encourages listeners to get reflective on whether they are overfunctioning by paying attention to their focus on doing everything perfectly and whether resentment is building towards others. Overfunctioning is a pattern that can be changed by accepting your own limits, saying no, accepting good enough, and asking for help. Challenging the overfunctioning dynamic can help support moving towards more sustainable functioning and also impact overall dynamics of stress and anxiety.

In this episode, Elizabeth B. Burton highlights the significance of the counseling relationship as being key for counseling to be purposeful and meaningful. Elizabeth encourages reflection on how the relationship feels for you and paying attention to whether it's a good fit or not. Sometimes this can mean working through some things that come up for a person and other times it means reevaluating the relationship and working towards finding a better fit.

In this episode Elizabeth encourages reflection around where we have a scarcity mindset and how comparison often feeds a scarcity mindset. In noticing a scarcity narrative, we can then consider and name what we really long for and then press more authentically into true gratitude for what we do have.

Elizabeth highlights the importance of considering core beliefs and how these beliefs impact how you feel and experience boundaries. Many times boundaries are difficult for people, and instead of simply focusing on practicing boundaries, you can dig a little deeper and work to reframe core beliefs that may be influencing the challenges with setting boundaries.

In this episode Elizabeth encourages letting go of any unrealistic expectation for perfection, and instead, moving towards authenticity while still holding tight to what you value. Elizabeth encourages this awareness of rigid, precise, all or nothing thinking and the movement towards a softer way of being in the world that includes more breathing room and more being real.

Elizabeth shares about the concept of giving yourself a seat at the table which is all about having a solid sense of self-worth and value. Elizabeth reminds us that just because we have a thought, does not mean it is true. In fact, we can begin to challenge faulty, critical narratives about ourselves and reframe our thoughts in such a way that support having inherent worth and value just as we are.

In this episode, Elizabeth Burton speaks into the dynamic of feeling overwhelmed and stressed leading up to Christmas and the holiday season. Elizabeth encourages awareness of the inner narrative especially messages about scarcity of time as well as having to be perfect. Elizabeth also encourages looking at the calendar and letting go of some commitments and naming what is most meaningful and important to you. Lastly, Elizabeth encourages simplifying when possible in order to enjoy and be present for the Advent season.

In this episode, Elizabeth encourages practicing gratitude in the midst of naming what's hard. When we do this, we ground ourselves in a wider, more true narrative that supports well-being and the complexities of both pain and joy and how they co-exist.

In this episode, Elizabeth B. Burton validates the complexity of the holidays and how much grief, pain, and longing is often experienced in the missing of someone who was with you as well as the ways you thought your life would be. Elizabeth encourages the naming and expressing of the grief, yet also the consideration of what might make the holidays feel more meaningful.

In this episode Elizabeth encourages reflection on your rhythms of work, rest, and play. If you are feeling a great deal of stress and burnout, it can be especially helpful to consider your daily rhythms, your weekly rhythms, and your monthly rhythms. Often a greater sense of well-being on a soul level may be cultivated by giving yourself permission and claiming space for rest and play.

Join Elizabeth Burton in reflecting on this important question that helps strengthen and solidify both identity and well-being. So much of our lives and time is about fulfilling roles, important and beautiful roles, yet there's an invitation to live more than a role, but to really be rooted and grounded and nurtured as a person.

In this episode, Elizabeth encourages attunement towards noticing and paying attention to what you need. Elizabeth also encourages for those listeners in close relationships to work towards both communicating what you need, but also asking that of your partner. By asking "what do you need?," you give your spouse both the gift of validation of their needs and care for their well-being. Naming needs involves stopping and pausing enough to notice and ask the question and can lead to deeper understanding between people as well as to more nurtured people all around.

Elizabeth shares the reflective question "What am I carrying that's not mine to carry?" and expounds on the concept--encouraging compassion and empathy for others, yet the laying down of any extra burden to rescue and fix something that is not yours to carry in the first place.

Elizabeth shares about navigating friendship in the midst of life transitions by working to intentionally still connect with friends from the past, yet also being open to the gift of new friendships. This is especially relevant for supporting a big life change, whether it's leaving home and going to college or another adventure or simply making a move from one community to another.

In this episode, Elizabeth reflects of friendship that refreshes the soul and encourages noticing on a soul level how you feel in your friendships--noticing whether you feel encouraged, lifted, and accepted as this fosters a strong sense of connection and gratitude. If you are parenting an older child or adolescent or even college aged, consider sharing this episode with them as it can be especially relevant in friendship formation.

In this episode, Elizabeth B. Burton walks you through the practice of naming your values. When you can name what you value most, it impacts so many facets of our lives including making decisions. Naming what you value most is especially relevant for navigating friendships and relationships of all kinds.

In episode two of the Narrating Hope podcast, Elizabeth B. Burton shares about the concept of delighting in small things. This involves noticing what is most life-giving to you and is a foundational part of well-being and soul care. This is something that can be cultivated both in yourself and in the lives of those you are in relationship with.

This is the introductory episode of the Narrating Hope podcast by Elizabeth B. Burton. This post is all about the concept of being held securely and the freedom that comes with that.