Third of a Lifetime

Best Tweets for Trauma and PTSD Survivors is a weekly Friday feature. My selections are entirely subjective, and I know it will never be possible to include every great resource tweeted. But I can try! I’ve personally read all tweeted links, and believe them to be of great value.

Disclaimer: I am in no way responsible for content found on any other website. Stay safe, and don’t follow links if you believe you might be triggered by them. Also, I will not be re-checking links from older Best Tweets posts, and if the site’s archived URL is different from the one I’ve provided here, you may need to do a search on their site.

Please Share My Stuff! You can now “like” and “share” this post everywhere with the touch of a button or two at the end of the linked tweets! Feel free to do any or all of that! (And thanks.)

Photo Credit

@soulseedz “There is nothing more supple and weak than water
and yet no one can resist its action
and no being can do without it.” ~ Tao te Ching

Six Standalone Tweets to Ponder

@CombatPTSDblog “How to be whole when all we can see is the shadows of our past swimming near?”

@DrJennifer “Peace comes from within. Do not seek it without.” ~ Buddha

@soulseedz “Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.” ~ Rumi

@Tamavista “Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one’s definition of your life; define yourself.” ~ H.F.

@ShareAwakening “The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely.” ♥ ~ Carl Jung

@back2incomplete “When you can see no light… be the light.”

Linked Tweets

@SarahEOlson2009 7 Signs You Might Need a Mental Health Checkup
[SEO: "Everyone has bad days. And many have bad weeks. But when feeling depressed, stressed, or anxious stretches out over a period of several weeks and begins to interfere with daily life, then mental health professionals may need to be involved. Here are some signs that you or someone you care about need evaluation and possibly treatment."]

@Good_Therapy Ways to Play: Self Love
[SEO: "There are no physical, emotional, intellectual, or spiritual benefits to low self-esteem. On the other hand, when you value yourself highly you are most likely positive, consider life to be a playful adventure, are confident in your abilities, maintain a healthy lifestyle, laugh a lot, and are never bored by what life offers."

"One of the benefits of play is that as you experiment with breaking through barriers by trying on new experiences and making decisions you learn to recognize your successes and celebrate your accomplishments. The more you nurture yourself along the way the more love you can share with others." Includes discussion of six "playful" steps you can take to improve self-esteem and self-love.]

@MentalHelpNet Depression from Chronic Pain: Should You Try Physical Therapy?
[SEO: Distinguishes between clinical depression and the depression that comes with chronic pain. "I personally find the depression from daily, unrelenting pain to be a hundred times worse to deal with. It is truly the worst depression I have ever felt. Some days it becomes painful to even try to smile. With bipolar, I tend to laugh and try to hide it and fool people. I can't do that with pain." Discusses misconceptions about physical therapy, and why you might want to try it.]

@Good_Therapy Herbal and Natural Supplements for Insomnia
[SEO: A good discussion of natural supplements to help beat insomnia, as well as behavioral steps you can take to increase your odds of getting a better night's sleep. Disclaimer: Heed the warnings to not take these supplements with alcohol or other sleep-inducing or -enhancing drugs, and consult with your doctor prior to beginning them. On occasion, supplements interact with other unrelated types of drugs as well.]

@ssanquist 21 Ways to Overcome Disappointment (via Beyond Blue blog)
[SEO: "'We would never learn to be brave and patient if there were only joy in the world,' wrote Helen Keller. How I wish she were wrong. Disappointments leave us with the unpleasant task of squashing, crushing, and pinching lemons to extract any and all juice. Here, then, are a few of my techniques to turn sour into sweet, to try my best to overcome disappointment." Some of them may be familiar, but others just might surprise you.]

@Good_Therapy Learn to Sit with Discomfort in Your Life
[SEO: "What if sitting with discomfort helped us make peace with it, increased our frustration tolerance and our ability to accept life as it is? ... Give yourself permission to feel your feelings. With practice, it will help you accept yourself and your reality. By resting in awareness you stop fighting what is true for you now and open to the possibility that it is all OK. You can handle what you don’t like."

"It is crucial to understand that the goal here is not necessarily to figure out why you are feeling what you’re feeling, but to stay with the discomfort. You may even want to cultivate some curiosity about what you are feeling." See also the next post below for more on this topic.]

@sanzplans Do you know how to “just sit” with your feelings? (via @ssanquist)
[SEO: (This is part of a series, but it looks like you can pick it up wherever you are.) "Being able to tolerate discomfort and distress, without running, escaping, self-medicating, or just in general freaking out is a great skill to have in your back pocket… in case your front pockets get jam-packed."]

@psychcentral Got criticism? 3 Steps to Break the Self-Judgment Habit
[SEO: Post first suggests how to recognize and stop the urge to criticize others, and then addresses the urge to criticize ourselves. "The reality is most of us actually criticize ourselves more than other people. We can play this same game. In other words, we can notice when we’re criticizing ourselves (there is likely lots of opportunities). Then we can become aware of the feeling that’s there and break the cycle of self-criticism."]

What a week! Every Friday I collect favorites from my Tweet stream. This week, the first section is about Hurricane Irene. While perhaps not technically a “favorite”, Irene impacted millions of people — and still is — and was the impetus for great stories and photos. And then there’s the rest of the stuff. Enjoy!
 

The Week of Irene

@twc_hurricane NASA image of Irene making landfall

@NewsBoston 25 Best Hurricane Irene Images

@NBCNewYork WATCH: Irene Coverage Recap in 3-Minutes (cool vid. thanks for sticking with us through the storm!)
[SEO: From the New York NBC affiliate, so of course it has a New York/New Jersey emphasis, but is a good recap if you're just now getting your power back. Mine was only out for 8 hours, and I'm grateful!]

@heykim Wow! A dozen wedding guests stranded by flooding, airlifted by helicopter
[SEO: They had their storybook wedding on Saturday at a Vermont Bed and Breakfast located on a farm. On Sunday, it all changed, including half the wedding party stranded on the wrong side of a bridge wash-out; wedding guests hiking in supplies to others stranded; and spending much of the week helping the locals clear roads. Even though it was literally a post-wedding disaster, the tone set by these out-of-towners was positive and "making the best of it". Includes a raw footage video from the air of damage in Vermont.]

@twc_hurricane Beautiful sunset imagery from NYC this evening post Irene

The Rest of the Best

@soulseedz “It may seem random the way people come in and out of your life, but their imprint on you is a gift.”

@heykim OMG! Stunning pic!!! ~ Dramatic moment thunderbolt lights up Eiffel Tower (via @stormchaser4850)

@Quotes4Writers “Writing is an escape from a world that crowds me. I like being alone in a room. It’s almost a form of meditation.” ~ Neil Simon

@joyful76 “We have to distinguish between catastrophes we can repair and those that require us to face a new reality.” ~ Elizabeth Edwards

@goodthingz 28 Unusual & Creative Clocks (check out the turntable clock)
[SEO: Fascinating assortment of clocks, some of which are so abstract I can't figure out where the time is. The math clock might be good for kids!]

@Quotes4Writers “Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; truth isn’t.” ~ Mark Twain

@DrAthenaStaik “I’m not crazy about reality, but it’s still the only place to get a decent meal.” ~ Groucho Marx

@goodthingz See No Evil — The UK’s Largest Street Art Project

@IvankaTrump “It occurred to me that the problem with doing nothing is not knowing when you’re finished.”