Are you familiar with your emotional bandwidth? If not there is no better time than now to get familiar. I have found this to be a great value as I have learned when I need to step away. We became comfortable with knowing our limits and how to better enforce boundaries.

In our first in what is going to be a continuous series of heavy metal-inspired meditations is a short breathing exercise. The goal is to help try to quiet the mind. We spend ten minutes together focused on our breath and the music.

In this episode Chad Rohrbaugh, our music producer, has what he calls Viking metal for us. I found it very calming when I first sat with it. What you will hear during this is what I was telling myself to do during this time.

I hope you enjoy our first attempt at Metal Meditation. There are more to come. Next one is scheduled for 9/26/22. Until then let us know what you think in the comments here or on the website.

Getting familiar with what motivates us is extremely important. We see it all the time in countless self-help memes. They all mean well but I have always felt they missed the mark a bit. After all, do we know what "motivation" is? And if we do, how do we take that motivation and apply it so we can use it? What about self-discipline, is that important, or do we just need motivation? For such a seemingly simple idea, "just find your motivation and you can succeed," it is filled with so many questions.

It is my hope in today's episode we start to understand the power and strength we gain in understanding these ideas. That they are not just some self-help guru crap that has no value, like snake oil from the past. But real, valuable skills we can use! We can take motivation and self-discipline with us to grow even farther than we thought possible. At least that's my hope! 

Before we get into this deep and exciting world of emotions we need a solid base. A common ground to start from so we are, at least some what, on the same page. To be able to at least be able to know four emotions by the time we are done.

Talking to my new psychologist she said something that blew me away. I never knew that bipolar disorder can present with rage in the manic phase! Right! Maybe you knew that but that is news to me. I had to look over my past and find some articles on this idea. Have you experienced this? Do you have people in your life you can reach out to with trust and vulnerability? If not I am willing to be your safe place to share and talk without judgment.

An Unrecognized Symptom of Bipolar Disorder: Rage by Dominique Castro

Bipolar Disorder & Anger: Understanding and Getting Control of Irritability By Denise Mann

It is one thing to say that we are working to be better it is quite another to put it into action. In the last episode of season three, Matthew shares a chance to put his compassion into practice. At the moment there are a lot of changes in the show and his personal and professional life. We are also going to be launching an official Patreon page.

Matthew sits down with Marie Thouin to talk about her doctoral thesis on compersion. She shares some of her insight.

Music is original and produced by Chad Rohrbaugh at Rohr Sound Studios.

Please stop telling people that it is just as simple as “all you have to do is choose to be happy!” This is dangerous and damaging to people. They feel broken or wrong when they can’t choose to be “happy”. What does it mean to be happy?

Music is original and produced by Chad Rohrbaugh at Rohr Sound Studios.