I’ve been reflecting recently on how different my experience has been in sitting with how I feel over the loss of my younger brother in May this year. 

 

I came to meditation practice after the death of my Mum in 2005. I’d been on a Mindfulness and Compassion course in Brighton run by Suryacitta. The meditation and and Voice dialogue practice, allowed me to gain some relief and release from my early rage. 

Dear reader, this post is an very small extract taken from Suryacitta's latest book, The Happiness and Contentment Workbook - Embracing your Natural Joy. It is packed with short simple effective exercises such as the one below. The book is an actual workbook in which, you write your own responses to a series of questions and prompts, and it is also beautifully illustrated.  

 

 

You probably know already if your assertive self is present in your life, but we can explore the issue and become clearer and more honest about it. The assertive self is often banished when we are young as we don’t want to disappoint our parents and guardians, so we learn to please them so that we are accepted. 

When we don’t assert ourselves we tend not to get what is due to us and tend to feel bad about ourselves. We may go over a situation in our mind time and time again thinking, "Why didn't I say that?" or "If only I'd done this". This can lead to feelings of blame, depression and anxiety.