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Are you experiencing self-doubt and feeling stuck?

Do you have a hard time feeling happiness or joy? Do you compare yourself to others, assuming that you are in some way flawed? Are you tired of striving for perfectionism? Is there an area of your life where you want to make changes, but are afraid to try? Do you often have thoughts that you are not enough? You may be having a hard time identifying your support system. Or, you may also feel like you are going at it alone.

We all experience and struggle with questioning our worthiness from time to time. It is normal to occasionally feel stuck, question our value, or feel disconnected from others. Sometimes, finding empathy and compassion for ourselves can be very difficult, which makes the process of moving forward that much harder. Perfectionism and feeling like we are never enough can be difficult to shake. Whether you are experiencing challenges with being kind to yourself, moving forward with your goals, connecting with others, comparisons, and/or self-doubt, The Daring Way™, based on the work of Dr. Brené Brown, can help train you to manage these difficulties and move towards authenticity, courage, resilience, and wholehearted living.

The Daring Way™ Training can help you cultivate compassion, courage, and connection.

The Daring Way™, based on the work of Dr. Brené Brown, can help you to explore and embrace vulnerability, courage, and worthiness and give you the tools you need to engage in wholehearted living and decrease avoidance and overwhelming fear. According to Dr. Brené Brown, wholehearted living includes cultivating resilience, authenticity, compassion for self and other, and knowing that whatever we accomplish in a day is enough. https://www.youtube.com/embed/iCvmsMzlF7o?wmode=opaque&enablejsapi=1

The Daring Way™ at MindWell NYC is a groundbreaking program to help you build courage and resilience with the support and guidance of a therapist with special training in the material, Dr. Jessica Renz, Certified Daring Way™ Facilitator (CDWF). Based on research with thousands of participants, the program is designed to help you combat shame, speak your truth, own your story, set boundaries, and move forward in a part of your life.

About The Daring Way™

The Daring Way™ is a highly experiential methodology based on the research of Dr. Brené Brown. The method was designed for work with individuals, couples, families, work teams, and organizational leaders. It can be facilitated in clinical, educational, and professional settings. During the process, facilitators explore topics such as vulnerability, courage, shame, and worthiness. Participants are invited to examine the thoughts, emotions, and behaviors that are holding them back and identify the new choices and practices that will move them toward more authentic and wholehearted living. The primary focus is on developing shame resilience skills and developing daily practices that transform the way we live, love, parent, and lead.

Further information is available at www.thedaringway.com.

About Brené Brown

Dr. Brené Brown is a research professor at the University of Houston, where she holds the Huffington Foundation Endowed Chair at the Graduate College of Social Work. She also holds the position of visiting professor in management at the University of Texas at Austin McCombs School of Business. 

Brené has spent the past two decades studying courage, vulnerability, shame, and empathy. She is the author of six #1 New York Times best sellers and is the host of two award-winning Spotify podcasts, Unlocking Us and Dare to Lead. 

Brené’s books have been translated into more than 30 languages, and her titles include Atlas of the Heart, Dare to Lead, Braving the Wilderness, Rising Strong, Daring Greatly, and The Gifts of Imperfection. With Tarana Burke, she co-edited the best-selling anthology You Are Your Best Thing: Vulnerability, Shame Resilience, and the Black Experience. 

Brené’s TED talk on the Power of Vulnerability is one of the top five most-viewed TED talks in the world, with over 50 million views. Brené is the first researcher to have a filmed lecture on Netflix, and in March 2022, she launched a new show on HBO Max that focuses on her latest book, Atlas of the Heart. 

Brené spends most of her time working in organizations around the world, helping develop braver leaders and more-courageous cultures. 

She lives in Houston, Texas, with her husband, Steve. They have two children, Ellen and Charlie, and a weird Bichon named Lucy. 

It makes sense that you sometimes feel disconnected.

Given that we exist in a culture where we experience regular messages about how vulnerability equal weakness, it is no surprise that you would feel this way. By trying to push vulnerability and emotions aside, we are unable to connect emotionally with ourselves or with other people, leading us to feel disconnected and isolated. In our program, we help you to find the courage and insight needed to firmly set aside these myths of vulnerability and to fully allow yourselves to be seen. We also learn the truth about why vulnerability is so important in our lives and begin to practice it as part of becoming more resilient. Additional work in the program that helps to decrease feeling disconnected includes clarifying your values, making choices that are more in line these values, and staying out of judgment.

You may wish you could connect more with joy.

The Daring Way

Joy can be difficult to experience, because when we do feel joyful, we often have worry thoughts about when it will end or question whether we deserve it. We also feel extremely vulnerable when we experience this emotion. Dr. Brené Brown’s research has identified gratitude, acknowledging how grateful we are for something, as a way to participate in and stay open to joy. We will teach you strategies to identify and lean into joy while cultivating a gratitude practice to help you to experience joy more regularly.

It can be hard to accept parts of yourself that you don’t like.

This is something that is tough for most people. It can be hard to accept that there are parts of ourselves that we wish were not there. Perhaps you get angrier at others more than you would like, or maybe you tend to end friendships quickly when you would really like to hold on to them. The Daring Way™ at MindWell NYC can increase your ability to identify and accept these parts of yourself and maybe even move towards changing them. Learning how to accept yourself and your story is key to moving towards belong, joy, and meaningful living.

You might have a hard time managing shame.

Most people do not connect easily with shame. Please keep reading. Shame is an emotion we all experience, but we are afraid to acknowledge that it is there or to share it with other people. Shame is the feeling that you are not enough, that you do not deserve something, or that you don’t belong. Shame tends to show up in all sorts of behaviors – those related to body image, overworking, or isolating. Unfortunately, not dealing with shame only leads to more shame and pain. In our program, we will teach you shame resilience skills and strategies to learn how to recognize shame and its’ triggers, check the facts on messages and expectations that are contributing to shame, using empathy to decrease shame, and asking for what you need when you feel it.

You might wish that you could be more present in your daily life.

With difficulty being vulnerable and connected to others often comes anxiety and shame, which can take us out of the present moment. The Daring Way™ can teach you skills to increase your ability to pay attention, or be mindful, so you are not missing out on the sometimes incredible things going on around you. Presence in daily life leads to less struggle as well as increased moments of joy and pleasure.

You may have concerns about participating in The Daring Way™.

I am anxious about participating in a group. Most clients express this concern when they are thinking about joining a group. Many people, understandably, have ideas about what a group looks like. The Daring Way™ group is not like many other types of group therapy (where people share without direction or structure). The Daring Way™ group is a structured yet flexible environment with exercises, connection with peers, discussion about resilience strategies and how to use them effectively, and the practice of mindfulness and compassion. The group itself defines the boundaries that it needs in order to feel safe and supported.

I don’t want to talk about shame or vulnerability. This is totally understandable given how difficult it can be to sit with these experiences. We will teach you empathy and self-compassion skills to help you learn how to combat shame and manage vulnerability head on. Shame and unwillingness to be vulnerable keeps us stuck and feeling disconnected. As a team, we will practice identifying shame and vulnerability and letting go of unhelpful messages from ourselves and others. We will share our stories, building courage and resilience. We do not need to experience shame or vulnerability alone and are all capable of experiencing a sense of love and belonging.

I don’t want to let go of my perfectionism. This is understandable given that the quest for perfection often gives us the sense that it can help us minimize pain or judgment. Unfortunately, in reality, perfectionism tends to lead to shame, pain, and blame. We can explore how perfection seeking impacts our lives and will slowly work to tolerate and later embrace the reality and beauty of the messy lives we lead. Healthy striving is what we want to work towards.

You Can Show Up. Be Seen. Live Brave.™

In our program, we will explore giving ourselves permission to move towards the life we want, challenge unhelpful beliefs about vulnerability, and gain clarity about our values that will help us to move forward. At MindWell NYC, we will work with you to create goals based on the areas of your life that you want to improve. Dr. Jessica Renz, Certified Daring Way™ Facilitator (CDWF), has specialized training in facilitating this program and can attest to the benefits of engaging in this work.

If you are ready to work on finding and owning your courage, building a life that feels like it’s your own, or have questions about the program, please contact us for a free 15 minute phone consultation today by calling 646.809.5440 or clicking below. We are happy to answer any questions you have about the process.

The Daring Way

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