How to Check Back In From a “Checked-Out” Life
“Learn a simple technique to stop going through the motions and start living a connected life.”
By Abigail Cole Hardin, CLC; PNLP
According to psychologist, Dr. Nicole LePera, over 90% of people live dissociated lives. Another way to say it, is most people are on autopilot (light’s on, but nobody’s home)! I was in this ninety percent, until I learned this simple, yet poignant life skill. I learned how to notice.
The art of noticing is actually very difficult when you are disconnected. I had to practice another life skill of consistency to take small steps to get in touch with myself instead of being consumed by or checked out from the world around me.
A lot of us go with the motions of life.
We have become human “do-ers” instead of human “beings!” This state of constantly “doing” gets us out of touch with our bodies, emotions, and soul’s longings.
It’s like we are spinning on a hamster wheel, until an injury, emotional breakdown, or a “how-did-I-get-here?” epiphany stops us in our tracks.
My Journey
After years on the hamster wheel, accelerated by living in New York City, my health failed me, my emotions went haywire, and I didn’t know what I wanted anymore. I was forced to face my “checked-out” lifestyle and finally check-in.
My journey started with yoga. I needed to first check in with my body before I could check in with what I was feeling.
I remember my first restorative yoga class. This was not a workout by any means. Instead, I was lying on my back on the floor. The instructor said, “Now, I want you to notice your body. If you feel any aches, or can tell a shoulder higher than the other, whatever it is—do not judge it. Do not have a reason to explain how your body is the way it is. Simply notice it.”
My mind was dumbfounded. I was so used to judging my body—demanding perfection and resilience. This “noticing” was a new concept.
When I noticed my body, imagining it separate from me and simply observing, I soon began to form a relationship with my body versus seeing it as some shell. I could finally give my body value and recognition for all it had done for me.
I realized how harsh I had been to it for years—not giving it sleep, proper nutrition, or nurture. I also noticed it was carrying grief.
The body is the gatekeeper to our emotions.
It will not reveal all the feelings that we have “checked-out” from until we are ready to face them.
I had years of checking out from my emotions, so I needed to face a lot. The Hardwired to Heal workshop really helped me by giving a framework for how to manage all that I was noticing. (I highly recommend this life-changing weekend intensive!)
I learned from the workshop the power of the brain. Neuroscience validates the life skill of noticing.
I started facing my emotions using neuroscientist, Dr. Daniel Siegel’s, “Name it to Tame it” concept.
When we actually notice what we are feeling and name it, like fear, sadness or anxiety, we automatically change the state of the overwhelming emotion and “tame it.” We stop the freefall and get back in the driver’s seat.
Also, I learned techniques to tame my thoughts in my practice as a Neuro-Linguistic Programming practitioner.
Every thought that we have has an image, a sound, and a feeling attached to it. If we adapt our internal experience by adjusting these three modalities, we can face our emotions and change our external reality.
Basically—in noticing my thoughts, I overcame the “mental game!”
Learn the skill of noticing by doing these three steps:
1. Observe your body without judgement.
Where are you holding tension?
What can you relax and let go of?
How is your breath?
2. Identify your thoughts.
What is the message that you tell yourself or hear?
Are you placing expectations or demands on yourself or others?
What would you like to think about?
3. Name your emotions to tame them.
Are you worried, anxious, fearful, etc. or not sure?
If you’re not sure, continue to pay attention to your body. Breathe deeply.
How would you like to feel?
Noticing is a critical life skill because it actually gets you back in your skin so you can live your life from the inside out – which is where your best life occurs!
So, start today by simply asking yourself the above questions in the morning and evening.
If you are struggling with noticing, there is usually a reason!
Looking back, I checked-out or “dissociated” from my life because I thought if I truly noticed what I was doing and feeling, I would not be able to recover.
Yet in my healing and using the life skill of noticing, I learned that I can be present and face intense emotions like stress and fear because I am designed in God’s own image. He gave us a higher governance of thinking that we can use to find safety in noticing our minds, bodies, and souls.
As Isaiah 26:3 so clearly says, “You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you.”
While yogis talk about the “mind, body, soul” connection, I see the relationship of the Trinity—the Father as the mind, Christ as the body, and the Holy Spirit as the soul.
When we start waking up to our lives and simply noticing our breath, our thoughts, emotions and deepest longings—we are not only going to experience life in technicolor, we are going to live the life God always intended for us—free to simply be.
Abigail Cole Hardin is a Certified Life Coach and a Neuro-Linguistic Programming Practitioner for Hardin Life Resources
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