How Mindfulness Can Soothe Tension at Family Gatherings

By Angel Cleare, BS

 

As we prepare our Thanksgiving meals, we may reflect on how this family gathering unfolded last year. It may have started well, with many smiles and joyful conversations of family members sharing what was happening in their lives. But, when everyone sat down at the dinner table, one family member couldn’t stop complaining about the food, and another couldn’t resist voicing their antagonizing opinions. Knowing this may happen again, we may ask ourselves, “What can we do differently this year?”

“As we all know, we can’t control what others say or do, but we have some control over how we react, and this is where mindfulness can help,” says Sharon Brock, MS, member of the Stanford Lifestyle Medicine Gratitude & Purpose pillar and UCLA Certified Mindfulness Facilitator. “By centering yourself with meditation before guests arrive, you can set the tone for harmony. And if conflict still arises, you can practice mindfulness in the moment to help you handle the situation with more composure.”

Brock is the bestselling author of The LOVEE Method, a five-step mindfulness tool to help manage emotions in real-time and bring us into a state of clarity and balance. LOVEE is an acronym that stands for label, observe, value, embrace, and equanimity.

“Let’s say you experience a strong emotion, like anger or anxiety. It can be processed by the mindfulness practices of labeling, observing, valuing, and embracing the emotion. When the emotion has settled, a clearing is created for equanimity to arise,” says Brock.

“Equanimity means having an even-keeled, calm, and balanced mind, which can come in handy when spending the day with challenging in-laws,” says Brock.

How to Respond vs. React

So, what can we do when a disagreeable family member starts talking politics and activates a surge of anger within us? Most people either retaliate with a scathing comment or hold back and swallow their rage. Since neither option is a healthy way to process emotions, Brock offers a third option to transform this difficult emotion with the steps of LOVEE.

“If anger gets activated while seated at our Thanksgiving table, rather than be overly expressive or repressive, we can take a deep breath and mentally do the label and observe practices,” says Brock.

When doing the label practice, Brock recommends phrasing the label “anger is rising” rather than “I am angry” so that we create some space between ourselves and the emotion.  For the observe practice, Brock advises doing a quick body scan to locate and observe the emotion as a sensation in the body. She shares that observing our emotions allows us to recognize that they are temporary experiences, not permanent states. Knowing that the emotion will eventually pass can help us stay calm in the moment.

“Emotions are energies in motion; they are not personal,” says Brock. “When we don’t identify with our emotions and we simply observe them as fluid sensations in the body, we are acknowledging the emotions for what they actually are—energies in the body that rise and fall, come and go.”

Brock offers these scripts to say to ourselves in the heat of the moment to soothe our emotions:

• “Anger is rising. I feel the sensation of my heart beating fast. I take a deep breath, observe the sensation, and not react. I may respond after the emotion has passed.”
• “Anxiety is rising. I feel the sensation of clenching in my stomach. I take a deep breath, observe the sensation, and not react. I may respond after the emotion has passed.”
• “Sadness is here. I feel the sensation of heaviness in my chest. I take a deep breath, observe the sensation, and not react. I may respond after the emotion has passed.”

Mindfulness and Self-Compassion

Brock says that the label and observe practices are effective mindfulness techniques for calming ourselves during a time of conflict. However, if the anger remains after the challenging moment has passed, she recommends going through the rest of the steps of the LOVEE Method as a formal meditation.

After label and observe, the value and embrace practices bring self-compassion into the meditation, which research shows offers psychological healing. During the value practice, we accept our emotions as natural aspects of the human condition, acknowledging that others would feel the same in the given situation. We also value our emotions because they have something to tell us, such as revealing a desire for harmony within the family.

Self-compassion deepens with the embrace practice. Here, we give our emotion a “hug” and say to ourselves, “I see you. I hear you. What do you need?” When working with anger, the need is often for respect. In this case, Brock recommends putting both hands on the heart and saying to ourselves, “I respect you.”

“Acknowledging that we are not alone and offering ourselves what we need helps soothe our emotions. With these practices, we are offering ourselves compassion and we are learning to take care of ourselves emotionally,” says Brock. “Over time, self-compassion practices help us to meet our own emotional needs, which fosters independence, resilience, and self-confidence.”

Cultivating Equanimity

After we have processed the emotion with the practices of label, observe, value, and embrace, the final step is equanimity. Here, we return our attention to the original person or circumstance that activated the intense emotion.

During this step, Brock invites us to repeat the equanimity phrase: “Things are as they are, may I accept things just as they are.” Or, in the case of the difficult family member: “They are who they are, may I accept them just as they are.”

Brock clarifies that accepting is not the same as condoning someone’s behavior or implying that the circumstance is morally right; rather the purpose of repeating these phrases is to bring our nervous system into balance and cultivate equanimity in our psyche.

“Equanimity is not about stepping back and not taking action; rather it allows us to take wise action from a place of calm and reasoning,” says Brock. “With an equanimous state of mind, we release resistance and resentment, and we are better able to navigate challenging circumstances with strength and grace.”

Click here to listen to the LOVEE Method meditation or here to learn more about Brock’s mindfulness offerings.