Peaks of the planet.
Charlamagnea god here And as we come closer to closing out this year, I just want to say thank you for tuning into the Black Effect podcast Network. There have been so many great moments over the past year. Take a listen to some of those captivating moments in this special best of episodes.
This is the season for seasonal depression. And when I look back over the times that I've experienced seasonal depression, especially when I was living in Illinois, it was something about the changing of the seasons. But now I deal with it so much better, especially I live in Georgia. I live in Atlanta now, so it doesn't get as cold and gloomy it seems. You know, it's been raining a lot or windy, but I don't know the weather. At least the weather's a little better. But seasonal depression
and is a real thing. It really does affect people. So how do you know if you're going through seasonal depression? Well, literally, when the seasons change, you get down and it occurs at the same time every year. Seasonal effective disorder occurs in climates where there is less sunlight at certain times of the year. Okay, so I want to just encourage you guys who deal with that. Again, it is triggered
by changes in season. This form of depression usually occurs during the fall and winter months when there is less light and the days get shorter, and it's called SAD. SAD again, seasonal effective disorder usually lifts during the spring and summer months. I promise you it never failed from about who November to around March. It definitely affected me living in the Midwest with all the snow and so you know, I had to get away and get in
the climate where it was warmer out for me. I have to have warmth, even though Atlanta can get cold. But yes, that is so true. So during the winter months when there's less sunlight and the days get shorter, all right not. According to sam HSA dot gov, not everyone with SAD has the same symptoms, but they can include sad, anxious or empty feelings, feelings of hopelessness, guilt, worthlessness or helplessness, loss of interest or pleasure, and activities
you used to enjoy. Fatigue and decreased energy, difficulty concentrating, remembering details and making decisions, thoughts of death or suicide, oversleeping, overeating, particularly with the craving for carbohydrates. What if I'm just greedy, honey, I love a good Texas toast, honey. Yah, yeah, I love just putting bread with butter on it and putting it in the oven on the broiler is different than
putting your toast in a toaster. You gotta let that butter kind of bake into and melt into the Breadge out, yes and okay, okay, okay, greedy smurf over here.
Symptoms.
Let's get back to the symptoms. Weight gain, social withdrawing, kind of you feel like hibernating, difficulty sleeping, lack of that tiet, irritability, and agitation. Okay. There is a such thing as a light. It's called light. It's like light therapy or a happy light. You can literally go on Amazon and get this light and you can put it on your desk, you know, and people absolutely love it. Or therapy to antidepressants. Vitamin D supplements may improve symptoms.
And I don't know. For some reason, I feel like I've heard it before that black people are prone to having more of a vitamin D deficiencyne So these symptoms sound similar and are exactly what depression is. It is a form it is a form of depression, all right. So and if you notice that you literally get sad in the fall and it lasts till about the springtime, it literally is called sad. Now, light therapy. Let's go talk about light therapy. Okay, there literally is a light
therapy lamp. Y'all their online for as low. I see one for twenty nine to ninety nine child at CBS. You can get go on Amazon right now and get you a light therapy lamp fifty one dollars, thirty nine dollars, twenty dollars, thirty dollars, seventy dollars.
Child.
They got light therapy lamps in all brackets as far as you know what you would want to pay for it. But I always say, definitely consult your doctor first. And I am dealing with sad at the moment, but I still think I'm gonna order me a lamp, child, And that's why I love. I love. I think, you know, having doing you know Florida ceiling windows, being able to have a lot of light come in come in in
your house, having a lot of light in. Now, if you walk around your house naked all the time, you might want to, you know, get you some shears, or maybe you don't care. Maybe you're free, maybe you don't mind people walking down the street and they look in your condo or your brownstone, your apartment and see your sweet cheeks in the window because you like to walk around naked in e KK I D So I definitely wanted to speak into those that have sad. I have
had it. It is not fun, especially when you already you know, I have dealt with depression in the past that.
Had nothing to do with this season.
You know, I've had depression in July, and you know, so I get it. But again I do. I do know what sad feels like. I could call oh and maybe about two years ago I could feel it trying to come on, and I was like, uh so, now that I know what it is, and if I feel something similar, I just counter it. I was like, no, And that's the good thing about having the tools, you know, going through enough therapy, going through enough healing. You know, if I didn't have enough healing, you know, I would
probably be in a moment of sad. But now when it's cloudy out, I pray for rain, like, oh Lord, let the rain come and wash this patio of you know, if it's cloudy, like all right, even though it's caudy, I know the sun is still shining up there somewhere, and that's for life. It may seem cloudy, it may seem dim, but just know the sun is still up there.
I began to think about the difference between living and existing and just trying to gauge the areas that I've just been existing in and areas that I think I'm thriving in. Thriving and living because life is going to always present a set of challenges, and my desire is for divine strategy and divine wisdom on how to navigate the obstacles.
And challenges that come my way.
Not only divine wisdom and strategies on how to overcome those those obstacles. It's like, okay, also, Lord, place divine help around me. But that is going to require trust, which I think I've said before, I haven't had an assistant. Ooh, I haven't had a real assistant in over ten years because of my lack of trust. And I've got to get over that. I've got to give people an opportunity not to prove themselves, because I wouldn't want anyone to work for me and think they have to perform for
my trust. Now what do I mean perform? Well, let me do this to make sure that she no, no, no, no no. I want you to be you. And I've been reading this book. It's a brand new book by doctor Henry Cloud called Trust. So y'all know doctor Henry Cloud is one of my favorite author of Safe People and Boundaries. He's got a few different versions of boundaries. He's got a boundaries and dating boundary. I mean, just so many. He's the bomb, amazing great psychologist, but he
talks to you in a practical way. He's from Louisiana, so he's got a definite down to earth approach. And the subtitle of his book Trust is called Knowing when to give it, when to withhold it, how to earn it, and how to fix it when it gets broken. So I'm going to dive into some of those excerpts later. But I was trying to just figure out areas that I'm thriving in and then areas where man, have I
just gotten so numb in certain areas? And so I just felt led to encourage some folks out there who are kind of walking through life a little numb because that's how you chosen to protect yourself. You know, like when you go to the doctor and they have to give you a shot, or you're getting some dental work done and you gotta get a shot, so they'll numb the area, and it's kind of like for your protection.
So that you don't feel the pain. I will never forget.
A couple of years ago, I had a dream that I was being rolled into a surgical room and I was getting surgery or they were gonna cut a leg or something, but they did not want to give me anesthesia. And I remember I kept screaming, I don't want to feel the pain. I don't want to feel the pain. I don't want to feel the pain. Like, bro, give me medicine, give me anesthesia. Numb the area. So, yes, numbing the area that's painful before you put a needle lined or do surgery or whatever.
Yeah, that's good.
It is a form of protection so that we're not terrorized by pain later, so that we're not terrorized to go to the doctor, you know, for surgery or to get you know, a shot or medicine, and you got to get an IV I get it, I get it, But there are some times where you're gonna actually have to feel the pain in order to heal the pain.
I cannot heal something that I don't feel. You cannot walk around numb your entire life, because to me, when you're walking around numb, that means there's some areas of healing. And I think we lessen the quality of life when we walk around just so numb and we just want to be so disassociated. And actually, disassociation is actually a trauma response. It's what is happening to you as you are being abused or in an unsafe environment. You literally
mentally disassociate yourself. It's like out of body. I don't want to see it. I don't want to hear it, I don't want to feel it. I remember back in twenty eighteen, I had a moment of disassociation, and I don't remember the phone calls made to me. I don't remember anything that I even did in that period of time.
So you can chucks.
It could be disassociation, or it could even be a psychotic break, like you're so traumatized, you just now. This is different to me blacking out to do harm to somebody else. I'm talking about what happens when something has been done to you, or you've gotten some news that you just couldn't handle. Have you ever seen a love doing or maybe yourself when you got news that someone passed away and it was unexpected and you pass out,
You black out, you don't remember anything right. But then there's sometimes where we are aware of the moment, but for the future, we just do things in our life where we're like, you know, I don't want to feel the pain. It's because you don't want to feel the pain. You won't go over grandma's house anymore because y'all are so close, and when she passed away, you just can't.
You don't want to feel the pain. You don't want to.
You don't want to smell fried chicken no more because it reminds you of your best friend, because y'all used to smoke weed and eat chicken wings when you had the munchies.
And now they're no longer here.
Or you're even grieving someone who's actually maybe y'all broke up and you just want to disassociate yourself from the memories, or you want to disassociate yourself from.
The pain that they caused you.
I get it, but we got to heal that pain so we can be able to feel the wind on our cheeks, the sun beat on our face. You want to be able to feel the love that someone else is trying to give you, but because you're so blocked off, you can't feel love.
And I know you ain't giving love.
So I just wanted to speak into that. You know, and sometimes in order to feel the pain to heal it, I would encourage you to unpack that pain with someone, a professional or someone that you deem safe. I don't know if y'all have been following me on social media, but I have really been about safe people and boundaries. And someone asks me, how do you know if you're honoring your boundaries? On the post where I said are
you a safe person to yourself? I said, I know being around safe people, being in relationship with safe people is wise, but are you a safe person to yourself? Do you give yourself grace? Do you honor your boundaries? So someone asks me a really, really, really good question, what's an example of honoring my boundaries? So even at the podcast festival, I brought this up. Honoring your boundaries
looks like this. Some of you are getting good at maybe setting boundaries with family members, because family members, especially when you're on a healing journey, when you've been to therapy, or when you've become self aware, when you're to the place of okay. I will not tolerate disrespect in any form.
I don't care from who, because I even feel like family, especially people from the older generation, feel like they can talk to you any kind of way, and they use the excuse, honey, I'm old, tiney, so I can say whatever I want. No, just because you're seventy years old does not mean you can talk to me or my children, or my husband or wife, my dog. You just can't talk to us any kind of way. I feel like if you're twenty years old, seventy years old, ninety years old,
that there is just a certain way you talk to people. Now, I have some relatives who are a little unfiltered, but because I know the posture of their heart, I don't necessarily get offended. But there are some people who are unfiltered who want to be malicious. They use their mouths as swords, as knives, as daggers. That's when it becomes problematic. Now you can probably identify one or two people in your family or friend circle.
There are some of.
Y'all, even me, who are like, you know what, I can only be around so and so for about thirty minutes.
So the boundary is you set a boundary.
Okay, I'm gonna go to this family picnic and I'm gonna only stay for thirty minutes. You have set a boundary because you know that after you being somewhere for thirty minutes, somebody starts acting a fool, or they start asking you questions, because once they get comfortable, it's kind of like they real you in and get comfortable, then
they start being disrespectful. So honoring your boundaries also means, Okay, I'm gonna go to the wedding, even though my family crazy, I'm gonna go to this wedding, but I know of AIN'TI So and so says something to me disrespectful. I am going to say so and so this is disrespectful. Or you may say, if someone gets disrespectful, I'm going
to leave. That is your boundary. So once someone gets disrespectful, you pick up your handbag or your pocket book or your what do you call it, your knapsack or whatever it is that folks are wearing nowadays, and you exit stage left, you get in your card, and you go home. That's what honoring your boundaries mean. Also, honoring your boundaries could be as simple as somebody you that's listening right now.
You might have somebody who's always negative. They get on the phone and you might say, honoring a boundary is I'm only talking to so and so for five minutes, because when six minutes hits, they just gonna start being negative and complaining, and they're never They never want a solution anyway. They just want to vent and complain and gossip.
A boundary is.
I don't want to completely exit their life, nor do I want them to exit my life.
I just know that I can.
Only be around so and so for about five minutes because then it goes left.
That's a boundary.
So I have been reading something by Lisa Arbiter, but therapists Nedra Glover Tawab talks about boundaries.
She's the author of Set Boundaries.
Fine Piece, a Guide to rea Claiming Yourself Okay. Boundary setting is a form of self care that's just as important as eating well and getting enough sleep. We treat self care as an optional practice, y'all. Boundary setting should not be optional. Okay, it should not be optional. So I love how you know. She talks about the best way to express boundaries. She says, communicate clearly and follow up diligently. Keep your message short and to the point.
She says, state your boundary in one or two sentences. She says, stick to This is my solution for this issue. For instance, I'm happy to travel to your family's house on Thanksgiving, but I don't want to stay the entire weekend. I need some time to decompress.
She says. Don't bring up the past.
You don't have to say that time you made us stay ten days was miserable. She said, you don't have to do that because, she said, that can cause an unnecessary argument and derail your conversation. And don't tack on too many details, which may obscure your point entirely.
She says.
Once the boundary is set, you need to reinforce it, which might mean repeating yourself several times. She also says, you know, how do you get started? You know, choose a few non negotiables, like I take a walk every day at lunch, or I set aside time to sit in silence every morning and do them without apology. Schedule them in your calendar if you need to. Self care practices are most effective when done daily, but every bit count.
Once again, thank you for tuning into the BLACKFG podcast Network. See You Are twenty twenty five for more great moments from your favorite podcast