The Power of “I am okay.”

And I’m not talking about the reflexive response to the question “How are you?” I mean this in our downward spiral moments. The moments of “I’m doomed”, “Things don't work out for me,” “I will never have what I want”, etc. We all have them, and we all know how convincing those voices sound in the moment. And obviously, we don’t want to stay there long.

Enter: “I am okay.” 

Because it’s usually difficult for us to switch from survival, fear based thoughts to the grounded, life affirming lens of “everything works out for me”, a stepping stone is usually helpful.

I want to be SO clear: “I am okay” is not about bypassing our feelings or parts that feel we most certainly are not okay. This is just about nervous system regulation in the moment when we feel our internal alarms going off.

This tool is for when your boss is breathing down your neck, your kid is tantruming, you get bad news about your parent’s health, or even your marriage is falling apart. The idea is not suppression, the idea is a pivot towards regulation so you might be able to problem solve more effectively.

Examples:

“Even though I am heartbroken, I am okay.”

‘Even though I feel overwhelmed by the way this is unfolding, I am okay.”

“Even though this is going drastically worse than anticipated, I am okay.”

“Even if this doesn’t go the way I planned, I am okay.”

Sometimes I even like to play the game of imagining the worst possible outcome, to prove to myself that I’ll be okay. Because even if things go terribly terribly wrong, if you’re here, reading this, at least some small part of you knows it to be true, that you will be okay. After all, you’ve already survived everything that’s happened thus far.

And if you continue to believe in the future you desire, the life you are building on purpose… if you continue to do your inner work and take inspired action…

You will most definitely be even better than before.