Restlessness in Spirit

Every Sunday morning, early while the moon still holds the sky, I take a water, protein shake, and a cup of coffee to my desk. I sit down with my laptop, journal, and to-do lists from the prior week. I audit those lists while I sip my coffee and transfer any uncompleted tasks or next steps to a new to-do list for Monday morning.

Some weeks, this meeting with myself is joyous and full of celebration for another week of consistency, tasks accomplished, and seeds sown. Other weeks, it requires a great deal of grace to face myself and accept what has not been taken care of and those items that I procrastinated; most weeks, though, it's a whirlwind of both of those emotional rollercoasters—great splashes of joy from the growth evidenced by my tasks of the week and gut-wrenching jolts of shame from the lack of forward movement in other areas of my life.

This morning, I finished these tasks and lamented the effort that appeared to have gone to waste. I stretched to relieve the tension that had slowly climbed up my back and into my neck, and I glimpsed my arms in my peripheral vision. My mental spiraling suddenly slammed to a full stop. There was unmistakable growth in my biceps over the last four months. Over the previous eight weeks, I'd gone three times a week for a 45-minute training session. While I did not walk out of those 24 sessions feeling like I had made a noticeable leap of progress, here I am after a mere 24 sessions of being consistent, with visible muscle growth. Honestly, I walk out of most sessions questioning if I dug deep enough, tried hard enough, lifted enough weight, enough times with enough vigor to have the desired results.

The Body Remembers—and So Does the Brain

My very next thought was of how our brains are wired to keep us alive and safe, not to help us grow to achieve our dreams. The amygdala is a tiny but powerful structure that oversees responses to stimuli it regards as threatening. The amygdala's role in emotional learning and threat detection has been recognized by neuroscientists since the 1930s. Phelps and LeDoux (2005) describe the amygdala's central role in fear conditioning and how neutral stimuli become linked to defensive behavior after being associated with threat.

Much of the recent scientific interest in the amygdala stems from its role in fear conditioning, a form of emotional learning in which a neutral stimulus comes to elicit defensive behavior and physiological responses after being associated with an aversive event.

(Phelps & LeDoux, 2005, p. 175)

Let's think about that for just a moment. My entire 200-lb body is being directed by a piece of brain no bigger than two almonds. I hold that fact both terrifying and immensely reassuring, terrifying in that such a small piece of me has so much influence on my life, and reassuring because evidence shows that I'm more than capable of commanding control of much more than two almonds.

Rewiring the Mind—My Introduction to DBT

I was twenty-six years old when I discovered Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT). I would not be presenting my experience authentically if I did not state that the first time a therapist explained how using DBT exercises to address my mental health would benefit me, I audibly snorted in front of him. I can remember thinking that the therapist clearly wasn't experienced enough or hadn't heard me when I explained my feelings on my first 26 years of life.

Had he heard me correctly, he wouldn't have suggested things like grounding, paced breathing, self-soothing, "TIP" skills (Temperature, Intense exercise, Paced breathing, Progressive muscle relaxation), and the radical acceptance of reality to fix my mental health. DBT combines behavioral science with mindfulness practices to help people regulate emotion, tolerate distress, and interact effectively (Linehan, 2015). Distress-tolerance skills train clients to endure painful emotions or crises without impulsive or self-destructive behavior, focusing on acceptance rather than avoidance (Bornovalova & Daughters, 2007).

My life at the time felt like a boxing match, and I was stuck in the corner, taking hits round after round. So, with very little faith, I purchased The Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Workbook and began working my way through implementing the exercises into my daily life. I was carrying so much shame at this point that I couldn't even write my answers to the exercises in the book; I wrote them on loose-leaf paper with no context for fear of someone finding out just how much darkness lived in my mind.

Like the results from the gym, there wasn't a single therapy session that marked some grand epiphany about life, but finally, one day, I woke up and was glad I had survived the night, and grateful to start a new day. In fairness, this was brutal work, and there were countless setbacks, but I did develop the distress tolerance to face the things I was scared to admit were true. I learned to accept without collapsing under rejection, betrayal, and disappointment. It's important to note that I didn't just "roll over" on these topics; I developed enough faith in myself and my discipline to accept that these things had happened, but they no longer held the power to destroy me.

It was both emotionally agonizing and profoundly freeing. It's been almost a decade since I decided to take what, at the time, I was sure would be a fruitless journey into training my mind to operate the way I wanted to experience life. A decade later, I regard that decision as a foundational cornerstone of significant and irrevocable change in my life.

Faith, Neuroplasticity, and Growth

Neuroscientific studies show that consistent practice, whether physical training or psychological skill-building, literally reshapes neural pathways through a process known as neuroplasticity. Repeated regulation and mindfulness exercises strengthen communication between the prefrontal cortex and the amygdala, reducing emotional reactivity and increasing self-control (Davidson & McEwen, 2012; Reinen et al., 2023).

I now live a blessed life and am happy to wake most days. I can come to myself on Sunday mornings and think, I didn't accomplish everything I wanted this week, and I did my best, and it is enough, even if I'm still unsatisfied with the results. DBT taught me to hold two opposing truths simultaneously; it laid the groundwork for a viewpoint that allows for multiple conflicting perspectives and finds the underlying truth without judgment or shame.

Resilience and faith, like the brain, grow through repetition and continuous challenge. What may feel like restlessness is often evidence that transformation is underway. Today, I hold the restlessness in my spirit not as a moral failure but as a sign of growth.

References

Bornovalova, M. A., & Daughters, S. B. (2007). How does dialectical behavior therapy facilitate adaptive coping among individuals with borderline personality disorder? Cognitive and Behavioral Practice, 14(4), 558–568.

 

Davidson, R. J., & McEwen, B. S. (2012). Social influences on neuroplasticity: Stress and interventions to promote well-being. Nature Neuroscience, 15(5), 689–695.

 

Linehan, M. M. (2015). DBT skills training manual (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.

Phelps, E. A., & LeDoux, J. E. (2005). Contributions of the amygdala to emotion processing: From animal models to human behavior. Neuron, 48(2), 175–187.

 

Reinen, J. M., van den Bosch, L. M. C., Verkes, R. J., & Schellekens, A. F. A. (2023). Neural correlates of emotion regulation improvements after dialectical behavior therapy in borderline personality disorder. Frontiers in Psychiatry, 14, 1114529.

 

McKay, M., Wood, J. C., & Brantley, J. (2019). The dialectical behavior therapy skills workbook: Practical DBT exercises for learning mindfulness, interpersonal effectiveness, emotion regulation, and distress tolerance (3rd ed.). New Harbinger Publications.