The cognitive distortion I’m covering for today is “Shoulds”! 

Shoulds are things we expect ourselves or others to do. Like a list of rules 📝 we have about our behavior or the behavior of others. 

When people break our rules (or when we break our own rules) it might make us feel angry, 😡disappointed, hurt, shameful, guilty, resentful, or even disgusted. 

You might believe that you are motivating yourself with shoulds and shouldn’ts, but you’re leaving yourself with a big emotional consequence of guilt and shame.

A toxic “should” I hear all the time is “I should diet”, “I ate Taco Bell today so I should go for a run”, “I shouldn’t eat that”, “I should lose weight”. I’m totally guilty of this too. These ideas are symptoms of DIET CULTURE- a huge land mine of shoulds that prescribes expectations, rules, and behaviors for create perfect bodies (but not perfect minds, I might add). Diet Culture is a symptom of PATRIARCHY- and we all know how we feel about that, right? 😉

What “shoulds” do you tell yourself!?

Hey y’all! It’s Monday! Here’s a reminder that you are awesome and powerful and fearless! 🌿

Today was our first meeting for our free four part seminar: Stay Present and Don’t Get Murdered!!

We spent the afternoon at Studio PDX doing mindful yoga, running, and meditation along with OHSU neurologist and stress researcher, Jeffrey Proulx. 

Are you coming to our next session? Spread the word! Feel free to PM me if you have any questions. 🌿💕